Opinion ID: 2997523
Heading Depth: 4
Heading Rank: 2

Heading: alteration in legal status

Text: The plaintiffs contend that foster parenting is a career, the pursuit of which is a liberty interest. They reason that the State requires foster parents to have sufficient financial resources and permits them to hold outside employment only if it does not interfere with the proper care of the foster child. See Appellant’s Br. at 36-37; see also Doyle, 305 F.3d at 617 (“[W]hen a state actor casts doubt on an individual’s ‘good name, reputation, honor or integrity’ in such a manner that it becomes ‘virtually impossible for the [individual] to find new employment in his chosen field,’ the government has infringed upon that individual’s liberty interest to pursue the occupation of his choice.”) (quoting Townsend v. Vallas, 256 F.3d 661, 670 (7th Cir. 2001)). DCFS submits that foster care is not a career, but a contractual role created by the State for the purpose of assisting the unfortunate victims of child abuse or neglect. Appellee’s Br. at 50. Moreover, DCFS continues, the payments to foster parents do not amount to “income” but merely reimburse the parents for expenses incurred in caring for the child. Id. When a child is removed, the payments stop but so do the expenses incurred in caring for that child. Id. But see Lee TT., 664 N.E.2d at 1250 (holding that foster parents satisfied “plus” requirement because as a result of their listing on the state child abuse registry, the foster children were removed, they lost benefits available to them as foster parents, and they lost statutory preference for adoption). On the record before us, we believe that DCFS’ characterization of the situation is the accurate one. In analyzing a foster family’s liberty interest, the Supreme Court has recognized that “the typical foster-care contract gives the Nos. 03-3071 & 03-3191 41 agency the right to recall the child ‘upon request,’ and . . . the discretionary authority vested in the agency ‘is on its face incompatible with plaintiffs’ claim of legal entitlement.’” Smith, 431 U.S. at 860 (Stewart, J., concurring) (quoting Org. of Foster Families v. Dumpson, 418 F. Supp. 277, 281 (D.C.N.Y. 1976)). We believe that, although foster parents play an honorable and, indeed, noble, role in our society, that role cannot be said to constitute, at least for purposes of due process analysis, a “career.” 2. Property Interest The plaintiffs also claim that foster parents have a property interest in the benefits that DCFS makes on behalf of children placed in their care. DCFS responds that foster parents have no legitimate entitlement to the foster care benefits paid by DCFS on behalf of foster children in their care. “The hallmark of property, the Court has emphasized, is an individual entitlement grounded in state law, which cannot be removed except ‘for cause.’ ” Logan v. Zimmerman Brush Co., 455 U.S. 422, 430 (1982). “Once that characteristic is found, the types of interests protected as ‘property’ are varied and, as often as not, intangible, relating to the whole domain of social and economic fact.” Id. (internal quotations and citations omitted). DCFS argues that even though foster parents often come to depend on foster care benefits for common living expenses, they have no legitimate entitlement to the payments under state law. Appellee’s Br. at 49. In Youakim v. McDonald, 71 F.3d 1274 (7th Cir. 1995), we set forth the general principle that before an individual will be deemed to have a prop- erty interest in a benefit, he must show “more than an abstract need or desire for it. . . . He must, instead, 42 Nos. 03-3071 & 03-3191 [establish] a legitimate claim of entitlement to it.” (Emphasis added). Such a legitimate claim of entitlement, moreover, is “defined by existing rules or understandings that stem from an independent source such as state law.” Id. at 1288 (quoting Roth, 408 U.S. at 577) (alterations in original). In Youakim, we held that DCFS violated the due process rights of foster children by discontinuing their benefits because they lived with relatives that could no longer be licensed after legislative reform unless DCFS provided the home an opportunity to become licensed. Id. at 1292. Contrary to the plaintiffs’ assertion, however, we have never held that foster parents have a property interest in the foster care benefits paid on behalf of the children under their care. We agree that, under the present circumstances, the property interests asserted by the plaintiffs are not of the kind protected by the Fourteenth Amendment.