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The State of the Children: An Examination of Government-Run Foster Care
Notes
40 Public Law 96-272, The Adoption Assistance and Child Welfare Act of
1980. 1996 Green Book, p. 695.
41 For other causes of this bias, see Conna Craig, "What I Need Is
A Mom: The Welfare State Denies Homes to Thousands of Foster Children,"
Policy Review, Summer 1995.
42 Guardianship, shown in the California figure, is legal custody.
43 The "1996 Post-Election Survey" was administered by The Polling
Company in Washington, DC. A comprehensive survey including 74 questions
was administered by telephone to 1,200 respondents November 5-7, 1996. The
sample consisted of 800 actual voters, 259 registered nonvoters and 141
nonregistered adults. The margin of error for the entire sample is +2.8
percent at the 95 percent confidence level. The margin of error for the
voting subsample is +3.5 percent at the 95 percent confidence level. Participants
in the survey were asked the following question devised by the Institute
for Children: "Assume for a moment that you have decided to adopt a
child. In so doing, would you consider a child who is, or has been, in foster
care? Would you strongly consider, somewhat consider, consider only a little
bit or not at all consider adopting a child who had spent time in foster
care?" The Polling Company factored as positive responses only "strongly
consider" and "somewhat consider" into its conclusions; the
answer "consider only a little bit" was coded as a negative response.
44 Michael Shapiro, A Study of Adoption Practice (vol. III): Adoption
of Children with Special Needs, cited in Katherine A. Nelson, On
The Frontier of Adoption: A Study of Special-Needs Adoptive Families,
(New York: Child Welfare League of America, 1985), pp. 2-3.
45 Patrick Curtis et al., Child Abuse and Neglect: A Look at the States
(Washington, DC: Child Welfare League of America, 1995), pp. 86-87.
46 Ibid.
47 1996 Green Book, p. 713.
48 Patrick Curtis et al., Child Abuse and Neglect: A Look at the States,
pp. 90-91.
49 Tatara, Characteristics of Children in Substitute and Adoptive Care,
pp. 143-145. Data are from 18 states, accounting for 9,134 children, or
46 percent of the total estimated number of children awaiting adoptive placement
at the end of fiscal 1990.
50 The Institute for Children has presented the recommendations listed here,
beginning in 1993, in key states whose governors are making foster care
reform a top priority, as well as to members of Congress.