Adoption Update #8

It has been a while since I posted any updates to my blog. A lot has been going on the last few months outside of waiting for our referral. I had surgery a month ago out of state in Atlanta, so that has taken a lot of planning and the recovery was a little more tough than I thought it would be, so I'm now back to feeling somewhat normal again.

It has been 15 months since we entered IBESR and still no referral. So sad, I don't even know how I feel anymore. I guess just kind of numb about it, even though I think about it daily. Below are two new updates from our agency. One in May and one in June. 


We leave for Maui, Hawaii in two weeks for out 10 year anniversary trip! It's going to be AMAZING!!!

Haiti Family Program Update

June 5, 2015

Dear Families,

We have some great news to share with you!  

We have two families who have recently returned home with their children from Haiti.  One family returned home just last night with their son.  These are the first two adoptions completed with CAS families since the new IBESR regulations were implemented and our first families’ home from Haiti since November 2013.  Both families were non-Hague transitional cases with an approved I600A. 

These two families submitted their dossiers to IBESR in June 2013 and received their official match from IBESR in September 2014.  Their bonding trips were completed in October 2014.   The Haitian court system approved their adoption in February 2015 and the US embassy gave final approval for the child’s adoption files in May 2015. 

Once the adoption files were approved by the embassy, the families were appointed a visa interview date.  Our legal representatives along with Gladys from MDA and the child attended the appointment as we have to apply with IBESR for the child’s exit permit once the embassy approves the visa and this can take 3-5 business days. The visas for the children were approved the same day.  The families then made plans to travel to Haiti.  Once they arrived to Haiti and received their children, they went with Daniel, our legal representative to the US embassy to pick up their child’s passport with visa and immigration documents to present to US immigration officials once they arrived to U.S. They also received IBESR’s exit permit which is required for the child to be allowed to leave Haiti.  

We are so happy for both these families.  As you can see from their timelines above, both families received their official referrals within the current estimates of 12-24 months after registration of dossier. The adoptions received final approvals 8 months later and they are now home!

We remain hopeful that other families will receive official matches soon and that the slowdown in processing of cases at IBESR that the US State Department discussed in their recent notice sent to you on May 18^th will be resolved. 

We hope you all have a wonderful weekend!

Tania Griasnow

Angela Jackson

Program Coordinators for Haiti Program

Adoption Update #7

Haiti Family Program Update

May 7, 2015

Dear Families,

We have a short update from our legal representatives in Haiti that we want to share with everyone.  If a child’s file is presented to IBESR by a crèche to be considered for adoption and the child has a living birth parent, IBESR officials will meet with each biological family considering making an adoption plan for their child.  A multi-disciplinary task force will work with the family to learn about their social history and current issues.  Every effort is made to keep the family unit intact.  If despite education and counseling the biological family receives, they remain committed to place child for adoption, and IBESR agrees that an adoption plan is in the best interest of the child, a one month waiting period ensues.  Only after a full month can a full consent for adoption be granted.  After a second interview with the biological family, IBESR may choose to issue a request to the Children’s Court to issue a Process Verbal terminating parental rights and authorizing the child to be adopted.

In the case of children who are found abandoned, the child will remain in institutional care for six months in the hopes the biological family can be found or will come forward.  If no family can be found, IBESR may choose to grant the crèche permission to present the child for referral for adoption.  In such cases, the Mayor of the zone in which the child was born must appear in Children’s Court to sign the Process Verbal for his eligibility for adoption.

Our legal representatives have indicated that IBESER has not been scheduling birth parent interviews recently as they wanted to work on the backlog of cases and also because the director had been on leave and not available to sign the referral letters.  They indicated they will resume scheduling of birthparent interviews in May and our legal representatives were informed that these will resume next week. We are hopeful that some of the children’s files presented by MDA will soon come out of IBESR so they can move forward with the matching process.

Please feel free to contact us if you have questions about this month’s update.

Tania Griasnow

Angela Jackson

Program Coordinators for Haiti program

Adoption Update #6

Haiti Family Program Update

April 2, 2015

Dear Families,

Happy spring!  It is so nice to see the flowers blooming and the weather getting warmer. 

Just a short update on a few things happening in Haiti

1)      According to the new protocol regulations of IBESR, post adoption reports will now be required at the following intervals and sent with translations to IBESR.  IBESR is now requiring 9 reports over an eight year period unless the child reaches age of maturity before the 8^th year (age 18).  These reports are as follows: 

·       Social worker written reports at 6 months, 1 year, 2 years

·       Reports at 3 year, 4 year, 5 year, 6 year, 7 year, and 8 year which may be completed by the            family and submitted to their agency to send to Haiti

·       Each report in addition to either the social work written/family written report must also        include a medical report and report from school (if child is school age) along with photos of the child with adoptive family

·       Each report must be translated into French.  Families will have the reports translated into French as with their dossier and sent to CAS to submit to Haiti.

·       These are the required country reports going forward for families adopting from Haiti.  Families will receive specific instructions from our post adoption department once they have arrived home with their child/children. 

2)     Effective immediately, families submitting dossiers to IBESR will be required to fully authenticate six documents instead of the previous four. The documents which must be fully authenticated are psychological evaluations on both adoptive parents, home study, powers of attorney, letter of introduction to IBESR, medical evaluations with lab results attached and the USCIS approval letter. 

3)     According to the new quota established by IBESR, our agency is able to submit 12 dossiers between October 2014 and September 2015 for regular, non-special needs adoptions and 5 additional dossiers during this same time frame for families open to special needs adoptions defined as children older than age 6, sibling group adoptions, or children with medical special needs.  We are closely monitoring the number of families in the program to ensure that as we receive dossiers we can submit them without delay to Haiti. 

4)     For those families who have registered dossiers with IBESR, our agency representatives in Haiti check with IBESR on a weekly basis to see if any registered families have received a match.  IBESR continues to move slowly with the official matching process and have indicated they wish to clear up the backlog of dossiers submitted prior to October 2014 when the new regulations took effect before moving forward with applications submitted after October 2014.   We continue to anticipate that once your dossier is registered with IBESR the wait time for a proposed referral is between 12-24 months.  The last three CAS families that received matches each waited between 12-13 months from registration of dossier at IBESR.  Those families who are open to older children/sibling groups may receive matches sooner due to the delay with IBESR and the children at the crèches getting older.  

Please feel free to contact us if you have questions about this month’s update.

Tania Griasnow

Angela Jackson

Program Coordinators for Haiti program

Adoption Update #5

Haiti Family Program Update

March 9, 2015

 

Dear Families,

 

We hope you are doing well and hopefully getting some warmer weather!  We are all ready for spring!

 

Things continue to move along in Haiti at a slow pace but we were excited to receive an official referral from IBESR for a family at the end of February of an older child from MDA.  The family’s dossier had been registered with IBESR for a year.  The family is making plans now to travel to Haiti for the required two week bonding period time.  Our other two families that had received official referrals from IBESR in September 2014 have completed their adoption in the Haitian court system and are waiting now for the final approval from US embassy so they can return to the Haiti for the Embassy process and visas for the children. 

 

We are hopeful that IBESR will continue to process cases that have been registered for some time and provide referrals to families. 

 

We want to remind everyone to keep an eye on your immigration approval and make sure you keep that current.  If you are in the process of renewing your immigration approval, please make sure that when you receive your notice extending approval that you make a photocopy of the approval letter from USCIS, attach an affidavit that you sign and have notarized and then translated into French.  Please send this to your program coordinator as soon as you have it so that they can submit to IBESR to update your file. 

 

Also, Silvia and Daniel recently signed the new protocol for adoptions in Haiti allowing our agency to continue assisting families with adoptions from Haiti.  There have been a few document changes to the Haiti dossier for families submitting dossiers.  If you have not yet submitted your dossier to Haiti, you will need to follow the new dossier guidelines.  Your program coordinator will be in touch regarding the changes that will apply to you. 

 

If you have any questions about this update, feel free to contact your program coordinator. 

 

Thanks,

Tania Griasnow

Angela Jackson

Carolina Adoption Services         

 

 





Adoption Update #4

Okay, so another update was sent to all the CAS families today (see below). The updates are not really any new, exciting news, but just kind of a "we have not forgotten about you guys" kind of email. I have connected with several CAS families that are waiting and we are all in the same boat. There has not been an official referral from our agency since September 2014. But it's comforting to know the other gals who are in the same agency. We are somewhat like a support group for each other. We talk through email, Facebook, and text :)

Our current home study expires in a few weeks, so my agency emailed me today with all the forms to fill out to update our home study. It's actually not as bad as I thought it would be. The worst part is having to go back to the doctor for the blood tests. The additional forms we have to submit are our taxes from last year and criminal background check. Our social worker then has to do one home visit. Again, praying that we have a referral soon!! None of this even seems real because all we have done is give money and paperwork to our agency, and we started this process in August of 2013 :( I can't wait to meet the little boy who will come live with us. 

Non adoption news - only 159 days until we leave for Maui, Hawaii!! Our 10 year anniversary trip!!

Haiti Adoption Update #4

Haiti Family Program Update

February 4, 2015

We hope this update finds your family well and hopefully not facing too much cold, winter weather.  We know some of you have been hit hard by the storms in the northeast.

Silvia and Daniel continue to check in with IBESR regarding our families who have dossiers registered to see if any have received matches yet.  They also continue to inquire about the new regulations being implemented.  If we receive word that a family has been matched with a child or if IBESR has requested any additional information, we will notify individual families.  Otherwise, families who have dossiers at IBESR continue to be on the waiting list for referral with little information available on timeframes for specific cases or status other than IBESR is working through registered dossiers.  

Our representatives did report they learned that IBESR has recently had to reduce staff due to a loss of funding. They had been receiving some financial support to implement The Hague but that funding has apparently ended and they have had to reduce staff which is causing things to move more slowly than hoped for.  As a result, we have not received a list of waiting children from IBESR and do not anticipate it for some time now.

For those families who had their dossiers already registered through our partner crèche MDA prior to implementation of the Hague convention, we are still hopeful you will receive a match through MDA depending on the children they have available that match your approval.  Silvia and Daniel are contacting other crèches to see if they have children available for adoption whose files can be submitted to IBESR.  Some of these crèches have higher fees for the care of the child and processing than MDA, so families receiving a match or referral from another crèche may have increased international fees upon referral that is due to the particular crèche where the child is residing.

In regards to those of you who have not yet completed your dossier, Silvia and Daniel have just informed us, that generally IBESR requests that documents be signed in blue ink so that they can tell that the signature is an original one.  They have not up to this point rejected any documents signed in black ink; but for future families submitting dossiers you need to be aware of this recommendation. 

We understand the changes in Haiti are taking time and that is hard for families; especially those whose paperwork is already submitted to IBESR.  We suggest that during this waiting time you continue to network with other families adopting for support as well as continue to prepare yourself through seminars, books, educational events.  Creating a Family (www.creatingafamily.org ) is a great resource for different adoption topics and radio shows.  We would encourage you to visit this site for topics of interest.  

If you have any questions about this update, feel free to contact your program coordinator. 

Thanks,

Tania Griasnow

Angela Jackson

Adoption Update #3

New update from our agency today.....

Haiti Family Program Update

January 16, 2015

Dear Families,

Happy New Year!  We hope each of you had a wonderful holiday season.  We received good news right before Christmas that we are one of the agencies that IBESR renewed accreditation to continue working in Haiti.  We are one of 18 US agencies reaccredited along with other countries including 2 in Germany, 3 in Belgium, 5 in Canada, 2 in Spain, 10 in France, 1 in Holland, 1 in Ireland, 5 in Italy, and 2 in Switzerland.  To this point, IBESR has re-accredited 49 international agencies to assist families with adoptions of Haitian children.

We were also pleased to hear that in addition to the quota of 12 dossiers per year our agency may submit for regular adoptions (children under age 5), we may also submit 5 dossiers per month for those families open to sibling groups, children over age 6 and children with special needs. We are still waiting on the list of waiting children from Haiti and are hopeful we can place some of these children with families. 

We do want to take time to remember the Haitian people this month as they remember those lost in the Haitian earthquake 5 years ago (January 12, 2010).  There were times of remembrance this week throughout the country.   There has also been some political unrest in Port-au-Prince with demonstrations related to the disbanding of parliament due to a stalemate between lawmakers and the President of Haiti.  A new prime minister has taken office in Haiti by the name of Prime Minister Evans Paul.  He is organizing the government and has stated a new electoral council will be appointed within weeks and legislative elections will be held this year. 

Due to the political climate, information from IBESR related to status of adoptions and family cases has been limited, but Silvia and Daniel are hoping to have an update on status of adoptions and particular cases soon. 

As we receive information on your individual case, your program coordinator will contact you. 

We also want to remind you to keep an eye of your immigration approval and keep that current.  You may want to contact your immigration officer 6 months prior to your expiration date if you are an I600A case to determine if you can renew under the I600A process or will need to switch to an I800A application.  

Please contact your program coordinator if you have questions about your particular case and we will be happy to talk with you.

Your Haiti Program Coordinators,

Tania Griasnow

Angela Jackson

Adoption Update #2

I figured I would just start numbering my updates as they come in at this point. Our adoption coordinator from CAS emailed all the waiting Haiti families today with some news. It's not really any good news, but I guess it's better than nothing. I feel more discouraged now, because there are so many steps to getting a referral and it's not guaranteed, especially if the birth parents change their mind and want to take the child back. I just don't know how much longer we can wait......I need strength. This is one of the hardest things we have ever done and our patience is being tested to the core!! Maybe this info will be beneficial to other waiting families as well:

Haiti Family Program Update

December 16, 2014

Dear Families,

We hope this finds each of you well and enjoying this holiday season.  We wanted to send out an update to all families in the program giving you some important information we have received from our representative in Haiti, Daniel. 

Daniel along with other Agency representatives, were invited to attend a meeting at the US embassy where the Consul General of the Embassy as well as other diplomatic officials, Haitian and foreign authorities such as the IBESR Director Mme Villedroin, and M. Guillame along with Mme Sawadogo the acting Hague Convention representative for Haiti were present.  Also in attendance were several judiciary officials for Haitian courts, including two Judge d’Enfants for the Port-au Prince jurisdiction, attorneys, and crèche directors.  

During this meeting, discussion was made of the progress that IBESR was making in implementing the Hague Convention.  Also discussed was ways that IBESR could be more efficient in the midst of changes to match available children to waiting families.  IBESR indicated that they are currently understaffed but are working to move through the process in accordance with Hague.  They indicated that non-Hague cases (those with I600A), would continue to be processed and they want to deal with these cases prior to processing their first Hague case.  

There is however a slowdown in the matching process of children to families, as IBESR must confirm that the child is fully adoptable.  To this end, they have instituted the following process before the child can be matched with a family.

1.      First, if the child has living birthparents they must appear twice or even three times to IBESR.

2.      The first meeting with the birthparents is for general information on adoption and what this means. They want the birthparents to fully understand the implications of placing their child for adoption.

3.      IBESR then has an additional one or two meeting with the birthparents and at the final meeting, if the birthparents are still in agreement, they sign a pre-consentment document indicating they are in agreement to move forward with the procedure for their child to be placed for adoption.    

4.      The case will then be submitted to the Judge d’Enfants which officially registers the family’s consent for an adoption (in this case an international adoption).  Once this document has been signed by parents and submitted to Judge, the parents have one month to reconsider their decision.  Once this time frame has lapsed the child’s file returns to IBESR so they can then officially match the child to a waiting, approved family. 

The process above has slowed down the matching process, as IBESR must wait until all of the above steps are completed before a child can be matched.  Also, if the birthparents change their minds, then the child cannot be placed for adoption.  As a result, the time frames from submission of dossier to being matched with a child is increasing. 

As many families are requesting young children 0-3 years of age and many preferring females, the wait for a referral will be longer.  However, we were pleased to hear from our representative that IBESR has indicated that they will be releasing the first of the New Year, a list of files of children that are ready for adoption, but for whom no family has been found yet.  These children will be older children or children with special needs.  We are hoping we can assist in finding these children families. 

On another note, crèche’s in Haiti have indicated that they continue to submit files of children to IBESR for the matching process.  Many of the crèche’s are not able to accept new children into their homes until some of the waiting children are placed.  Also, some of the children that crèche’s are caring for are not adoptable, as families sometimes due to family issues and poverty, place the children at a crèche temporarily.  This of course is putting a strain on all the crèche’s to care for the children as often a portion of the adoption fees paid by families go to support the work of the crèche and caring for the children.  

Our representative in Haiti is very proactive in going to IBESR weekly to check on the status of pending files to see if any of our waiting families have received matches.  When he has news on any of our cases, he will communicate that to your program coordinator.  Our in country representative will continue to attend meetings with Embassy and IBESR officials as they occur and update us on the continuing progress that Haiti is making with Hague adoptions.

We hope this update has been helpful in understanding the current status in Haiti and their progress towards implementing The Hague. It is a slow process, which is understandably hard for waiting families but we are encouraged to hear they are working and being provided technical assistance by our Embassy.

Feel free to contact your program coordinator if you have questions about this update.

We hope you and your family have a wonderful Holiday season!