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Please distribute to all parties interested in adoption reform
California Adoption Reform Effort - C.A.R.E.
Important information about AB 372 (Ma)
AB 372 will improve the ability of adoptees to access their original birth record in California, the largest state in the Union. It will allow an adoptee to apply for their original birth record without having to go to court and prove they are 'in necessitous'. We are at the beginning of this process, and the bill will continue to evolve over the next year. Passage in the Judiciary Committee is just the first step.
Privacy rights are paramount in California. There are existing laws that specifically govern the release of these records. AB 372 works within the law because it must. It creates a mechanism which would allow the records to be released without causing liability to the state. A great deal of effort has gone into finding this elegant solution.
A no vote on AB 372 is a no vote on access to records. There is no 'clear path for a rights driven open records bill' in California, as others suggest. There are laws and statutes in our state which do not exist in Oregon, New Hampshire, or Maine. Opposing this legislation closes the door on adoptee access, it does not open the door to new, "better" legislation. The laws will not cease to exist. The same obstacles will be in place a decade from now.
AB 372 will give hundreds of thousands of adult citizens adopted in California (who currently have no hope of ever having their own original birth record) an opportunity to know their original identity. Many of these citizens will die out of the system in the coming years. To oppose this legislation is to literally oppose their ability to have this record at any time in the foreseeable future. The opposition to this legislation is coming from many people who have no skin in the game. Adoptees from other states, birthparents from other states, adoptees who already have their records, are not the ones who should be influencing this decision.
Let California adoptees be the ones who decide. For those of us who would like to be able to access our original birth records during our lifetimes, AB 372 represents the best opportunity to do so.
Please add your voice to the voices of the California Adoption Reform Effort, and help California adoptees be provided dignity of having their original birth records.
ENCOURAGE MEMBERS OF THE CALIFORNIA STATE LEGISLATURE
ASSEMBLY JUDICIARY COMMITTEE
TO VOTE YES ON AB 372
The deadline for your letter to be included in the record is TODAY. Letters after today can help, but won't be in the record.
APRIL 21, 2009
5:00 Pacific Daylight Time
Please E-MAIL*the Assembly Judiciary Committee to vote YES on AB 372. A sample letter is attached
We encourage all California adoptees to attend the hearing.<http://www.calopen.org/attend.shtml>
<mailto:Assemblymember.Feuer@assembly.ca.gov>Assemblymember.Feuer@assembly.ca.gov;
<mailto:Assemblymember.tran@assembly.ca.gov>Assemblymember.tran@assembly.ca.gov;
<mailto:Assemblymember.Brownley@assembly.ca.gov>Assemblymember.Brownley@assembly.ca.gov;
<mailto:Assemblymember.Evans@assembly.ca.gov>Assemblymember.Evans@assembly.ca.gov;
<mailto:Assemblymember.jones@assembly.ca.gov>Assemblymember.jones@assembly.ca.gov;
<mailto:Assemblymember.Knight@assembly.ca.gov>Assemblymember.Knight@assembly.ca.gov;
<mailto:Assemblymember.Krekorian@assembly.ca.gov>Assemblymember.Krekorian@assembly.ca.gov;
<mailto:Assemblymember.Lieu@assembly.ca.gov>Assemblymember.Lieu@assembly.ca.gov;
<mailto:Assemblymember.Monning@assembly.ca.gov>Assemblymember.Monning@assembly.ca.gov;
<mailto:Assemblymember.Nielsen@assembly.ca.gov>Assemblymember.Nielsen@assembly.ca.gov;*
<mailto:info@calopen.org>
Attachment converted: Macintosh HD:SampleLetterCARE-AB372.doc (WDBN/IC˻) (00C69377)
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Have you read the 21 Apr 2009 version of California Assembly Bill 372? It looks nothing like the amendment from March, and resembles the piece of garbage originally introduced.
California Adoption Reform Effort and CA Assembly member Ma can go shove it. The latest version contains a pretty nasty veto on obtaining the OBC, as well as adding a six month waiting period, once the adoptee has requested the OBC through the Office of Vital Records/State Registrar.
AB 372 isn't about adoptee rights to OBC. It's about added legisation to establish "privacy rights" for birth parents, at the expense of adoptee's rights. Something birth parents do not presently have, and courts have upheld in California, as well as Tennesse and Oregon. Look up Doe v. Sundquist, as well as "Analysis of the impact of A.B. 1349 on the right to privacy under the California constitution", written back in 2001.
Were AB 372 to pass with it's latest amendments, it would set an extremely bad precedence in CA. As California has often been the trend setter in introducing law, which then become adopted (no pun intended) in other states, many adoptees could kiss their OBCs goodbye.
AB 372 is being railroaded. Look at the latest timeline of events: 15 Apr 2009, second amendment to AB 372. Hearing scheduled for 28 Apr. Hearing pushed up to 27 Apr, providing no time for anyone to voice any input to the judiciary commettee before the hearing. Read more at [url=http://www.calopen.org/]California Open[/url] and draw your own conclusions.
Both Cal Open and Bastard Nation have issued action alerts against AB 372
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