By Hugh Clark
Advertiser Big Island Bureau
KEALAKEKUA, Hawai‘i — Two attorneys have filed a class-action lawsuit against the Department of Human Services over its handling of adoptions of special needs children in foster care.
Kona attorneys Robert Kim and Elizabeth Croom claim children are lingering in foster care because the state is paying parents who adopt special needs foster children less than what they are entitled. This means a loss of millions of dollars in federal money, the lawsuit claims.
Croom said the agency is limiting adoption assistance payments to $529 per month when foster care payments are up to $1,055 per month. The monthly payment after adoption is supposed to be the same as that received when a child is in foster care, she said.
"If these children were adopted instead of being placed under permanent custody or guardianship, the state of Hawai‘i would receive 50 percent reimbursements for the vast majority of them because they would qualify for federal matching funds."
The lower payments also are a disincentive to adoption, she said.
The lawsuit defines special needs broadly to include factors that make adoption of a child less likely, including physical and mental disability, age, and being part of a sibling group being adopted together.
Susan Chandler, director of the Department of Human Services, yesterday declined to comment on the lawsuit’s specific claims. But she noted that the state received a $1 million federal bonus last year for having the nation’s best ratio of adoptions of children who were removed permanently from their parents’ care.
Chandler said the adoption rate would be higher if more qualified adoptive parents would come forward.
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