Post-adoption child care subsidy

It is absolutely the county you live in that will continue the subsidy payments for child care after the adoption goes through. There are very strict guidelines for this program. You have 90 days after the adoption is finalized to get your application in to the child care agency in your county or you forfeit the benefit - forever. It is very harsh!! In order for your county to process the application for continued payments, they must receive what is called a "referral letter" from DYFS (which basically verifies the date of the adoption and that he is subsidy eligible). You should have had to sign a document prior to finalization that laid out all the rules of the program and acknowledged your receipt of same. If for some reason you didn't or if the adoption worker never gets the referral letter to your county child care agency, you should call directly down to the Adoption Operations office in Trenton and ask to speak to your subsidy specialist (they are assigned based on the first letter of your last name). that number is 609-292-4441. The people in that office are amazingly helpful. Keep that number for future reference. I learned from talking to the subsidy worker in that office that they have "flex funds" available for adopted children to pay for camp programs, etc. I never knew that until she mentioned it!! I have a friend who has four adopted children and they were all able to go to camp for two weeks because I passed on the information I happened to stumble upon. Good luck!!