Be Our Guest / Marc Tuttle

Indiana leads the nation in foster care adoptions

Illustrating yet another way that Indiana is setting nationwide trends as a pro-life state, Gov. Eric Holcomb announced on Sept. 17 that Indiana leads the nation in the number of foster children who find forever families through adoption.

Last year, 2,489 children were adopted from the foster care system through Indiana’s Department of Child Services (DCS). This represents more than twice the number of foster care adoptions that took place in Indiana in 2015, indicating how strong the culture of life is in our state, as well as the leadership of Holcomb and DCS director Terry Stigdon.

“You all in Indiana are working hard to promote a culture of life by focusing on adoptions and child welfare,” said Lynn Johnson, assistant secretary for the Department of Health and Human Services’ Administration for Families and Children. Johnson was on hand representing the Trump administration, as they awarded Indiana a $4.7 million Adoption and Legal Guardianship Incentive Award for our state’s work to increase adoptions.

Out of the 49 states participating in the incentive program, Indiana was number one in our increase in adoptions from foster care. This increase is in part due to the pro-life and pro-adoption ethic that prevails in Indiana, but also because of several concrete steps taken by Holcomb at the beginning of his administration.

He put a priority on child welfare, and particularly on foster care adoptions, by creating the first-ever adoption unit within DCS. This has allowed the department to add staff regionally whose sole focus is on assisting family case managers with finding permanent homes for children when parental rights have been terminated.

In addition, Stigdon has more than doubled the number of adoption consultants in Indiana from seven to 19 and provided specialized training. The agency also launched an enhanced database for better tracking of adoption inquiries and a digital picture book of Indiana’s Waiting Children.

There is a myth being promulgated by abortion advocates that some children are unwanted. As we continue to promote the respect for all human life from conception to natural death, Right to Life of Indianapolis is ecstatic about the prospects of these children who have found forever homes.

Each one of them is a reminder that no child is truly unwanted. We as a state and those of us in central and southern Indiana are generous enough and loving enough to want and to welcome all children, no matter their circumstances or the circumstances of their parents.

This is the pro-life way.
 

(Marc Tuttle is president of Right to Life of Indianapolis.) †