In addition, the Senate bill would establish a federal adoptions record service for those who want to trace their biological parents. Such a policy may actually work to discourage adoptions or have the unintended consequence of driving up the number of abortions over time, because the privacy of those who place their children for adoption could be violated. Possibly worst of all, the Senate bill introduces new funding streams for institutional programs that could keep an abused child in his or her abusing family situation while the depressed, addicted, or homeless mother receives help. This push also would preclude congressional debate next year when the authorization expires, and thus would sidestep the new evaluation data due for that deadline. This Senate policy constitutes bad oversight.
Taxpayers have a direct interest in how the government helps foster children.
Congress should pass legislation that ensures better outcomes. Indications in evaluation data suggest that, in a significant portion of cases, the care of children by their kin delays permanent adoption. It also increases the cost of foster care by about 30 percent. A consequence of this practice is that it becomes yet another avenue for extended dependency on federal foster care income rather than independent living in an adoptive family. It would be paradoxical if, after the historic passage of welfare reform, the federal establishment of a kinship care program became a back door to providing Aid to Families of Dependent Children for extended families of abused children.