AUSTIN, Texas — Every week on KVUE, we feature a different child who is hoping to be adopted by a forever family. This week, we're answering questions from viewers about what the process is like to adopt a child from the Texas foster care system.
Rebecca Salam is a local adoption preparation supervisor with the Texas Department of Family and Protective Services (DFPS). She's worked with children in foster care for over 11 years and was able to answer some common questions.
"We're not expecting perfection," Salam said. "We're expecting safety."
She said when people first start looking into the adoption process in Texas, they often think adopting from a private agency is the same as adopting from DFPS. But those are two different processes.
"I think when people think of the word 'adoption,' the first thing they think of isn't necessarily adopting from foster care. They're thinking of private adoption, which can be very expensive," she said. "When adopting a child from the state, the process isn't nearly as expensive."
For people looking to adopt a child from the state's foster care system, it takes a minimum of six months. The timeline from there can range, depending on the case and how quickly adoptive parents move through the steps.
Initial fees can average around $300, going toward making sure a home is safe and ready for children. Then hiring an attorney for the actual adoption costs an average of $1,200. The good news is the state can help with those costs through different adoption assistance programs.
Single parents, LGBTQ+ couples and older people are all able to adopt children out of the Texas foster care system. And a criminal history is not an automatic bar from adoption – it depends on what the charges were and how long ago they happened.
Those just starting the adoption process are encouraged to create an account on the Texas Adoption Resource Exchange (TARE). For more information about speaking with someone from TARE directly, click here.
Another important thing to remember is that often, children in foster care have already been through a lot in their lives. One viewer asked, "How should a new parent handle trauma that a child has experienced from the past? What's the best way to show support?"
Salam said being open is very important.
"What I would recommend, honestly, is being open and willing to learn," she said. "Being a parent to a child who was experienced trauma and experienced things that inherently ... all adoption stems from loss. Kids are losing their biological parents, they are losing their communities, they are losing those connections. Some of them have moved so many times that every time they move, they lose friends. Ideally, we try to reduce the amount of loss our kids experience, but there is so much of it."
To learn more about becoming a foster or adoptive parent, you can attend a TARE information session. To learn more about local children in foster care who are currently searching for their forever families, visit the Heart Gallery of Central Texas.
KVUE launched the Forever Families segment with Partnerships for Children (PFC) in June 2020 to highlight children in the Heart Gallery of Central Texas who need secure and permanent families. Every day, there are nearly 1,000 children waiting to get adopted in Central Texas, according to PFC.
Editor's note: The children who are in the Heart Gallery program and featured in KVUE's Forever Families segments are children who have had every effort made on their behalf to connect them with family or others in their community to provide options for permanent, adoptive homes. Through no fault of their own, that hasn’t happened yet, and so in partnership with the Department of Family and Protective Services, we collaborate to bring awareness to KVUE viewers about these children in the hopes of finding them permanency before they age out.