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My Husband and I live in Vt. and we are in the process of trying to adopt our sson. He is placed with us through Maryland DSS. We live in VT and he has been with us since July 29, 2002. We have TPR and have been in supervised placement for over 180 days. The agency here sees no reason why the adoption should not be finalized. They have completed 4 postplacement visits and forwarded all reports to DSS in Baltimore. The case worker in Baltimore says that our file is missing "A child information packet." and a "life book. She says that without these two things the adoption can't be finalized.
Our son believes (even though we did not tell him this) that his adoption will be finalized before his 6th birthday (March). The social worker says that it will take at least until Nov. 2003 to complete these two documents. We don't believe that delaying this adoption is in our child's best interest. Does anyone know how to get a waiver in Maryland-or if Maryland adoptions can be finalized in VT. I have contacted our child's guardian Ad Litem for help, but haven't heard anything. Our supervising agency also wrote a letter to DSS asking them to request a waiver and info. about finalizing in VT. What else can we do? Has anybody out there dealt with this problem? I can be reached at pammuppet@hotmail.com Thanks
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Weel, that's an interesting stall tactic. Your agency, hopefully, is going up the chain of command in the other state. I assume you talked to supervisors and not just the caseworker. This is not in any way in the best interest of your child. What's your lawyer say? Can he shake anybody up and get them moving? What is a child information packet? Only one sib group of my kids had lifebooks, so I don't see how that holds up an adoption. They can find that later. IMO, Somebody's feeding you a bunch a bull and you need to figure out why they're stalling.
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I live in MD. My son isn't finalized yet and won't be for a while (subsidy hold ups). The life book thing doesn't make any sense. I have had several foster children and NONE had lifebooks. I know that my agency had to have 3 post placement visits, write up a report and recommendation and we had to have our homestudy up to date and a post placement training. But we are with a private agency. I understand Baltimore is difficult to work with and they are very backlogged. (I had a foster daughter who was waiting for a kinship placement for 8 months because it took Baltimore that long to get the home cleared). I agree go up the chain and if you don't see results quickly start calling govt. officials. It is rediculious that it would take you that long to get finalized!
Good luck
Since I last posted the problem has grown. Now we are being told that we get the $2,000 that they told us we would get for nonreoccuring adoption expenses as well. This wouldn't be a huge difficulty except that my husband is currently unemployed and we counted on that money to pay debts. Any one know where I can get more help? Should I hire a maryland Lawyer? any advice? thanks Pam
Stormy- what government official would you sugget I contact? We work with a private agency in Vermont. VCAS and they are helping us, but it seems like I need help in Maryland-which is why I tried to contact the Guardian Ad Litem in Baltimore. I was considering contacting the interstate compact person here in VT. to see if she can be helpful. VCAS has filed all the postplacement reports and they have made the recommendation that we be finalized as soon as possible. In addition they are looking into finalizing in VT. Anything else we should be doing? thanks Pam
Pam, give me a day or two to work on it. I have some papers around here somewhere of information regarding Baltimore Adoption lawyers and other information. I will also see what names and numbers I can find you.
Hang in there...you should get the $2000. I was always told that was standard in a special needs adoption. Especially for a child over 6! Are you working with Baltimore county or city? That will help me know which office you need to have the information on.
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The adoption is taking place through the City of Baltimore department of social Services. We were orginally working through Foster America. They arranged all the preplacement visits and escorted our son to Vermont. However, they no longer have a contract with the City of Baltimore. Thanks Pam
the help from this forum has been very valuable. The info. stormy and afamily inmaryland gave me has helped me make some progress with DSS. We did get in contact with our son's lawyer and I think she will help us. The more I deal with DSS throughout this country the more concerned I get about children in general. Again thanks for your help. I'll keep checking back Pammuppet