Foster Adopt information in Northern California

We are in Lodi and are licensed through S.J. County. We went the county route as children come through county first. If the county cannot find homes for children, they they contact the agencies. We have been waiting for TWO YEARS for an adoptive placement of a 0-4 year old. So frustrating! At times it has felt like an up-hill battle. One social worker 'forgot' to have our homestudy approved and took it home with her, on her maternity leave. I found this out six months later. We were matched at the start of the year with a five month old baby but no one bothered to ask the current foster mother if she wanted to keep her. The county decided they wanted to move her and we started transition visits; even having her overnight. We were new and did not know this. I was also upset that she did not tell me herself, when she met me. Now I know to ask. Honestly, if you want a baby and you can somehow come up with the money to adopt privately, then go that route. With the economic meltdown there just are not the babies coming in, in our county. It is so weird how all of the counties are different. If we were in Sac. then it might be easier. I wish you all the best and hope that you are one of the families that everything just goes well for. That does happen too :)

If you are with an agency, then you can pursue adoptions from other counties. We originally lived in a very small county, but lived next to a large county were all our kids are from. If you think your county is moving slowly an agency is probably a better choice

Thank you everyone we have narrowed it down to two agencies!

I went thru a private agency...I would be happy to email you info I believe they are throught California. We were down for 0-10 yo up to 4 sibs...We were matched very quickly. The kids are not from our county but rights were terminated so I didnt have to worry about driving for visits. Often when babies are taken due to drugs alcohol they have sibs. So if you want a baby a lot of times sibling groups are the way to go. Good luck!

I am in Stockton as well. I haven't had much luck going with the county no placements, I switched to an agency and had placements within a week of being certified. If you want to adopt you can do so with an angency. The county is doing all adoptions thru lilliput so you dont really have to go thru them to start with.

I am in Lodi. I called Lilliput in Stockton and they told me that if I wanted to adopt a baby (o-3) that I would be better off going through the county, so I did. The county is not doing ALL of its adoptions through Lilliput. I wish they were, because then I would switch over to them. Everyone keeps telling me that there just are not children coming in, that there was in the past (and that is a good thing for the children involved, I hope). If we won the lottery tomorrow, we would go private, because we are getting too old to wait much longer. We are already going to be the 'old' parents, lol.