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"53,642 foster children were legally free for adoption at the start of fiscal 1997." |
The federal government acknowledged 17 years ago that accurate tracking
data on children in substitute care would be important in addressing the
particularities of the system, but its mandates for information have largely
gone unfulfilled. Many states could not easily report basic, broad details
about their foster care caseloads. Some of the most important statistics
are largely uknown - like the number of children who have had their biological
parents' rights terminated and are legally free to be adopted. Today, most
national estimates fall well below the mark of the true number of children
who need homes. President Clinton's Adoption 2002 plan calls for 54,000
adoptions from foster care in the year 2002 - a goal that is barely adequate
to meet the need for homes for children who are parentless and legally free
to be adopted today. Recognizing that policymakers and the public did not
have this basic information on child welfare, the Institute for Children,
over a two-year period, gathered, updated and confirmed data for each state
and the District of Columbia. [See the Sidebar on Methodology of the State-by-State
Study.]
As shown in Table I, the Institute found that:
- At the close of fiscal 1996, 526,112 children were in state-run substitute
care.
- More than half of these children were concentrated in seven states.
- Based on written documentation from 47 states, 53,642 foster children
were legally free for adoption.
- The actual number of legally free children was higher, since Connecticut
and Montana reported that the number was "not available" and Arizona
and the District of Columbia left the survey question blank.
- 22,491 foster child adoptions were finalized in 47 states in fiscal
1996.
Because the foster care population is constantly in flux, the numbers reported
here are changing daily. Some of the children reported as free to be adopted
at the end of 1996 were already in pre-adoptive homes; others have since
been adopted. In the meantime, newly freed-for-adoption children have joined
the ranks of foster children who wait for permanent families. The Institute
for Children asked the states to provide a breakdown of the status of children
who were legally free to be adopted. Many were already in pre-adoptive homes,
but for a significant number of others, adoption was not a goal, despite
the fact that their biological parents' rights had been terminated. Figures
II, III and IV show the status of TPR children in three diverse states:
Maine, California and Wisconsin.
- No effort was being made to place for adoption 20 percent of the free-to-be-adopted
children in Maine and 15 percent in California. 42
- By contrast, only 4 percent of free-to-be-adopted children were in
long-term foster care or an Independent Living Program in Wisconsin.
As Table I shows, nationwide, eight of every 1,000 children were in substitute
care at the end of fiscal 1996. In some states, the prevalence of foster
care placement was much higher than the national average. In Illinois, it
was 17 of every 1,000; Colorado and Minnesota reported that 14 of every
1,000 children were in foster care; and the District of Columbia, reporting
for 1995, had a prevalence rate of 22, almost three times the national average.
Interestingly, substitute care prevalence rates do not seem to be predicated
on the size of the state's total child population or by the presence of
large urban centers. Included among the 10 states with the highest prevalence
rates were California, New York and Illinois, which have extremely large
child populations. Also included among the 10 jurisdictions with the highest
prevalence rates were North Dakota, Vermont and the District of Columbia,
which have very small child populations. Rural states (Oregon, Alaska) were
just as likely to have high prevalence rates as jurisdictions with large
urban centers (New York, District of Columbia).
More than twice as many children were legally free to be adopted at the
beginning of fiscal 1997 as were adopted in all of fiscal 1996. The six
states with the highest numbers of adoptions in 1996 all began the 1997
fiscal year with greater numbers of free-to-be-adopted foster children still
needing adoptive placements than the total placed during the prior year.
For example, Ohio finalized 1,201 adoptions during 1996, but began the new
fiscal year with another 3,588 foster children legally free for adoption.
[See Figure V.]
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![[See the Sidebar on Methodology of the State-by-State Study.]](http://www.ncpa.org/studies/s210/methside.gif){kind=link}
![[See Figure V.]](http://www.ncpa.org/studies/s210/fig5.gif){kind=link}