Adoption and Safe Families Act

We need to take a minute and look back on how this game started.

In 1974 Walter Mondale promoted the Child Abuse and Prevention Act which began feeding massive amounts of federal funding to states to set up programs to combat child abuse and neglect. From that came Child "Protective" Services (CPS), as we know it today. After the bill passed, Mondale himself expressed concerns that it could be misused. He worried that it could lead states to create a "business" in dealing with children.

Then in 1997 under President Clinton Congress passed the Adoption and Safe Families Act.
The public relations campaign promoted it as a way to help abused and neglected children who languished in foster care for years, often being shuffled among dozens of foster homes, never having a real home and family.

In a press release from the U.S. Department of Health & Human Services dated November 24, 1999, it refers to "President Clinton's initiative to double by 2002 the number of children in foster care who are adopted or otherwise permanently placed." It all sounded so heartwarming. We, the American public, are so easily led. We love to buy stereotypes; we just eat them up, no questions asked.

In the stereotype that we've been sold about kids in foster care, we picture a forlorn, hollow-eyed child, thin and pale, looking up at us beseechingly through a dirt streaked face. Unconsciously, we pull up old pictures from Life magazine of children in Appalachia in the 1930s. We think of orphans and children abandoned by parents who look like Manson family members. We play a nostalgic movie in our heads of the little fellow shyly walking across an emerald green, manicured lawn to meet Ward and June Cleaver, his new adoptive parents, who lead him into their lovely suburban home. We imagine the little tyke's eyes growing as big as saucers as the Cleavers show him his very own room, full of toys and sports gear. And we just feel so gosh darn good about ourselves.

Now it's time to wake up to the reality of the adoption business. Very few children who are being used to supply the adoption market are hollow-eyed tykes from Appalachia. Very few are crack babies from the projects. [Oh, you thought those were the children they were saving? Think again]. When you are marketing a product you have to provide a desirable product that sells. In the adoption business that would be nice kids with reasonably good genetics who clean up good. An interesting point is that the Cape Cod & Islands office of DSS leads the state in terms of processing kids into the system and having them adopted out. More than the inner city areas, the projects, Mission Hill, Brockton, Lynn, etc. Interesting.

With the implementation of the Adoption and Safe Families Act, President Clinton tried to make himself look like a humanitarian who is responsible for saving the abused and neglected children. The drive of this initiative is to offer cash "bonuses" to states for every child they have adopted out of foster care, with the goal of doubling their adoptions by 2002, and sustaining that for each subsequent year. They actually call them "adoption incentive bonuses," to promote the adoption of children. - Where to find the children ? by Nev Moore - Read more....

Welcome to Spy Nation

In 1974, Congress passed the Child Abuse Prevention Act, known as the Mondale Act (after Walter Mondale), which promised large amounts of federal funds to states to stop what was called an "epidemic" of child abuse. It was not long afterwards that individuals began to be charged with almost unbelievable crimes of sexual molestation, especially at day care centers. From the McMartin case in Manhattan Beach, California, to the Kelly Michaels case in New Jersey, to the alleged "sex ring" in Wenatchee, Washington, dozens of people were rounded up, tried in what could only be called kangaroo courts, and sentenced to multiple life terms.
(To prove that there is some justice in the court systems - at least at the state level - most of those convictions have been overturned on appeal, as appellate judges systematically pointed out that most of the defendants did not come close to receiving fair trials, that the prosecution coached witnesses and suborned perjury, and generally created witch hunt conditions.)

Unfortunately, the spirit of the Mondale Act lives on, as state officials in Maryland are constantly urging individuals to spy on one another. This creates an atmosphere that is hardly conducive to justice, and makes individuals vulnerable to the whims of others. For example, if a neighbor decides he does not like my children (or me), all it takes is an anonymous call on the state "hotline" to turn our lives upside down. By William L. Anderson, Ph.D -
Read more.....

Walter Mondale was right when he expressed his concern that passing a bill to adopt out more children could backfire - that states could create a business in dealing with children. He was concerned that, not child welfare, but the huge incentives CPS was given to take children and place them up for adoption would be the motivating force. He was correct in his assumption. But he went ahead and passed the bill anyway.Prior to that, Nixon passed a similar bill. Then, of course, Bill & Hillary Clinton did a major injustice to our countries' families by enacting the Safe Child and Families Act.

1. The woman accused of abusing, starving and holding nine adults and teenagers captive in her ritzy Florida home may have received as much as $2 million in child welfare payments
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2008 vs 1999

Working or NOT Working : that is the question

1999 - Report Shows Clinton Administration Strategy Is Working.

2008 - The State Is Finding It An Increasingly Costly Promise To Keep. Adoption subsidy pinches state

Adoption Bonuses: The Money Behind the Madness

Reforming the Child Welfare System. In 1997, the President Clinton signed the Adoption and Safe Families Act.For every child that CPS can get adopted, there is a bonus of $4,000 to $6,000. Since the Adoption & Safe Families Act, with states in competition for the Federal Funds offered for promoting adoptions, Walter Mondale expressed concerns that states could create a business in dealing with children.CPS and affiliates rewarded for breaking up families!
Must read

1999 - REPORT SHOWS CLINTON ADMINISTRATION STRATEGY IS WORKING.

Today - September 24, 1999, the President and First Lady announced bonus awards of $20 million to 35 states that have increased the number of children adopted from the public foster care system. These bonuses, awarded for the first time today, were first proposed by President Clinton's Adoption 2002 initiative and included in the Adoption and Safe Families Act of 1997. The President today also announced $5.5 million in grants to innovative programs that remove barriers to adoption, and he unveiled a national progress report on adoption that documents the success of the Administration's strategy. From 1996 to 1998, the number of adoptions nationwide rose 29 percent - from 28,000 to 36,000 - and is on a pace to meet the President's goal of 56,000 adoptions in 2002. This is the first significant increase in adoptions since the national foster care program was established nearly 20 years ago.
Read more.....

2008 - Adoption subsidy pinches state

Lawmakers look at rising costs of Oregon's support for kids adopted from foster care
SALEM -- The state of Oregon makes a promise to nearly every child adopted from foster care: We'll pay your expenses until you reach age 18, regardless of your new parents' income. But with the number of children receiving monthly adoption payments doubling in the past decade, the state is finding it an increasingly costly promise to keep. By MICHELLE COLE Read more....

Child Advocate
Suncana S. Alvarado
Los Angeles,CA
http://suncanaa.com/