Foster Children Need Permanency

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How would you feel after having two foster girls for 3 1/2 years with plans to adopt them, when suddenly at 9:00 one night, the state came in and took them under false allegations? That is what happened to us on June 24th. We love these girls very much and welcomed them into our family of two grown children. We felt we had a lot to offer children who needed the security and love we could give.

We never wanted to do foster care, but adopt children out of the foster care system so they would gain permanency in their lives. While I admire people who are called to do foster care, we knew we couldn't handle having children come and go, especially when at times they end up going back to an environment no better than before they were in foster care.

We had watched it happen too many times. You see, we had three sisters to begin with, but had asked one to be moved after almost two years because of some extreme behavior problems. It nearly broke our hearts to have to do that because we had wanted siblings to stay together. Our own children, friends, and family members encouraged us to do so because of the chaos it was causing in our home. The youngest one, the one we had asked to be moved, had made allegations last year but were determined "unfounded".

Supposedly, at the end of March at an interview with a lady from the guardian's office, one of the girls we still had said my husband had "tied her to a pole in the attic." We told the investigator about our attic, that we don't use it even for storage. There is no "pole" up there, only loose insulation. The girl said she never said that. Why would she? Unfortunately, one of the problems we had with the little one was that she lied often. She had tried to make it look like we had harmed her even when she was still here when we went out many times. She is a very troubled, angry little girl. Yet, the investigator chose to believe her rather than check the attic herself. My husband offered her a ladder to look up into the attic, but she refused it. The investigation didn't start until the first part of June, over two months after the girl supposedly made this remark. It seems like they would want to check such an allegation out right away. Even after the interview with the girls, the interviewer talked to me never mentioning anything about a pole in the attic. The next day when she talked to the social worker, her comment was, "We feel the girls are doing well. They're safe and ready to be adopted." Now we can't visit or even talk to the girls. Our attorney is working hard to get the girls back, but the courts in Cook County (Chicago) take so long to accomplish anything. If I had it to do over again, I would have had an attorney handy at a moment's notice.

This kind of incident happens often to foster parents. It seems as though foster parents don't have many rights when faced with investigators who charge in saying, "I can do whatever I want." The girls just started screaming that night and saying, "Why are they taking us? What did we do? Whatever we did, we will never do again. This is my worst nightmare. We want to be adopted."

It seems like they would know why there were being taken if something so serious had been going on here. We have been greatly encouraged by the support of our friends, neighbors, family, and church family. We could never have gone through this without them. Numerous prayers are going out for all of us. They all know my husband would never harm a child. He has been a soccer coach for many years, Sunday School Teacher, Youth Group Leader, and many other activities involving children. He was a wonderful father to these girls. He had mellowed as he matured and had more patience with the girls sometimes than I did. We both have always had a great love and compassion for children. Why else would we be willing to take in someone's children? These children come with much baggage, but we had worked through so much. They became kind, compassionate, loving girls. Everyone who knew them commented about how much calmer and more secure they had become. They desperately want to come back here and be adopted into our family, but it seems they don't have much say about what happens to them.

Please feel free to e-mail your comments. I'm interested in others who have had similar experiences. May God bless you. Thank you for visiting my page at Angelfire. Please come back and visit again! The story goes on. We had an appeal hearing on Wednesday, September 29th. The judge did not have both appeals before him, one for the decision to remove the girls, and one to reverse the report. There is an internal investigation pending so he couldn't hear the report reversal hearing. We believe this is another stall tactic to give the girls time to break the bond from our family.

It was very sad to hear the girls are not doing well and still want to come back to our family. They are having problems sleeping. Why wouldn't they after being taken out of our home at 9:00 at night?

Then, the investigator and three people from our agency sat in the waiting room discussing our case and what bad people we are in front of our daughter, pastor, and a couple of other people who had gone as witnesses for us. We have a hearing on Thursday, October 7th, to discuss visits with the girls. We're praying we will get a visit to reassure the girls we still have love them and want them back. They have no idea we're fighting the case. Our next hearing date is October 20th if the internal investigation is done by then.

We didn't get to have the visit hearing because our attorney's 19-month old son had to have emergency surgery Wednesday. He was going to try to get another date early this next week, but we haven't heard from him so far. We didn't get to have the hearing on the 20th. Our attorney received a report from the agency from an evaluation they had done on the girls. The problem is it wasn't with anyone who had a degree in counseling or phsycology, and, of course, it was very biased since it was done by an employee of the agency. Our attorney was to draw up a motion to request the girls be evaluated by an unbiased counselor.

Our next date is November 4th. In the meantime, we're all working on getting the internal investigation completed so we can have the whole hearing on the 4th. We didn't get to have the hearing on the 4th. The night before, our attorney called to say it was to be a teleconference. However, when the judge tried to call the other two parties, they were NOT available. The judge, of course, was not happy.

We haven't heard yet when the next date will be. In the meantime, I'm doing some media interviews. Hopefully, it will lead to some accountability for the opposing side. I did a newspaper interview yesterday, 11/10/99. It seemed to be very positive. It will probably be a couple of days or so before it's printed. The reporter was sick all last week so didn't get to work on the article. He planned to work on it this week, Thanksgiving week. It should appear later this week or next week. We do have a date for the full appeals hearings on December 8th and 10th, in case we don't finish the 8th. We have at least 15 or so people planning to go with the possibility of many more going.

We won't be able to have the hearing on the 8th because the director of the agency refused to give our attorney the documents he needs to proceed. They were having a teleconference this morning, the 7th, for the judge to tell her she must turn over the documents. Our attorney won't have enough time to read them and prepare until Friday. Next week, hopefully Monday, we will continue with the hearings. The reporter said the article should appear in Thursday's paper.

We're praying enough public outcry will be heard for great pressure to be put on everyone to get the case heard and decided quickly. We finally had the teleconference on the 10th. The judge told the director she either had to provide copies of the documents she would be using for the hearing or he would not allow them to be used. The article was in the paper this last Thursday, the 16th. It was good, but fairly neutral. I believe the reporter saw our side very clearly, but either didn't want to cause problems or was edited by someone. I know he has already received several responses.

Our hearing this Tuesday will be to reverse the report to "unfounded". We're praying there will be no further delays. Our next court date is the 10th of January. We were very disappointed not to have it settled before Christmas. Our family will sense the lack of completeness with the girls still missing. It's been hard to accept they won't be coming back, short of a miracle, until at least February. We finally were able to get the hearing started on December 21st. However, the judge had to leave because of a family emergency at 2:30.

The Department of Children and Family Services presented their case in the morning with their "star witness", the investigator. The attorneys had trouble getting her to answer their questions. Then, our attorney cross-examined her after lunch. The judge had to intervene to get her to answer our attorney's questions. Within a half hour, the truth came out. She admitted to having no criteria for "torture". She didn't even know what DCFS's definition was for it. I had looked it up the the Internet and gave it to our attorney. He had to spoon-feed it to her. She said she knew the girls suffered torture because they were afraid of us. However, she couldn't find anything written in her report that said the girls were afraid of us. She thought it was in her notes the night the girls were taken, but she had already decided it was torture. None of it makes sense. The investigator got very angry and frustrated. It was somewhat encouraging to us though to have the truth revealed so quickly. We are anxious to get the rest heard.

We now have two dates, January 10th and 14th in the afternoons. We're praying the judge will see the atrocity and falseness this whole case has been built upon. Also, our attorney was anxious to have coffee after the hearing ended to tell us something. He has investigated the case thoroughly and discovered the allegations came from the Public Guardian's office, Patrick Murphy, who is running for judge or state's attorney. For some reason, he thought this would further his political career. We certainly don't claim to understand politics, especially in Chicago, but we always thought the origination was political. We were fairly certain it was from the public guardian's office also. Apparently, the fuss we made about the girls not being adopted in a timely manner has something to do with it. It grieves us to think two little girls' lives are being damaged so greatly because of someone's political agenda.

On Friday, January 8th, I was able to talk to the girls. We received a letter from the agency about a meeting which would occur at the current foster parent's home, with their unlisted phone number. How could I not call them? After not having any contact since June 24th, it was obvious what to do. One of my friends had her son call at first so they wouldn't get suspicious. I wasn't really planning to talk to them, just my friend. She did all the planning. I got to tell them both how much we still love then and are fighting to get them back. One of my other friends was afraid it might hurt our case. Our attorney didn't really know whether it would or not. The agency will just claim we further traumatized them. We discovered they are being moved in with the younger girl forcibly. They were already crying when they came home from school because of leaving their friends at school. I just don't see how it will make that much difference.

Our court dates are the 10th and 14th of January. Hopefully, we will get this appeal to revert the report done and start soon on the appeal for the removal of the girls so we can get them back soon. We did have our hearings on Monday and Friday. On Monday, it was kind of depressing listening to the investigator, then the social worker lying again. Then Friday, the two foster moms testified. They also contradicted themselves several times. Our attorney caught them. He let them go on for a while, then jumped in with their changes. We're not even sure they realized most of the time how much they told different stories. The judge looked very puzzled several times.

Our next date is February 4th. They're hoping to finish with our witnesses on that day, but we can't imagine they will. We have anywhere from 8-12 witnesses, including us. Our attorney is trying to decide who to call. He will decide this coming week after reviewing all the testimony from this past week. As we suspected, we didn't finish on Friday, the 4th. The judge was very biased this time. He wouldn't allow several items to be presented as evidence, nor let our witnesses talk about the night the girls were taken. They had already discussed this at great length with several people, especially the state investigator. Our attorney finally got so frustrated at the opposing attorneys objecting to everything that he vented. The judge didn't comment. It certainly doesn't seem like this is going to be a "fair" hearing.

Our two children and we have to testify yet. Our attorney was having a teleconference with the other attorneys and the judge today to arrange the next hearing and talk about what will be admissible. It seems quite evident that a part of these allegations came about because of the investigator's ego. These investigators have way too much power and abuse it. She should definitely lose her job over this and probably many other similar cases.

We finally have a hearing date - April 4th at 9:00 central time, as long as everyone gets their documents exchanged. We had our hearing on the 4th. It went very well. The former social worker testified via telephone first. She totally contradicted what her supervisor previously testified. She said nothing but good things about our foster parenting. Our son and daughter did a great job testifying. Anyone with some intelligence could clearly see they are polite, nice young people who are doing well in life. I started my testimony in the morning, but we broke for lunch. The DCFS attorney had tried to get me to agree that having the girls run laps was corporal punishment. I disagreed. During lunch, our attorney said something that reminded me of a manual I had been carrying in my bag for months. It was put out by DCFS given to me by the social worker. It specifically stated that having children run laps was a a good ALTERNATIVE for corporal punishment. Our attorney got great pleasure from presenting this manual as soon as we started again after lunch. My husband had to go back for the cross-examination on Friday morning.

We are finally finished! However, the DCFS attorney claims she needs a WHOLE month to do her written closing argument. Our attorney said he could do his in two days! The judge related he could easily do his recommendation within 30 days. We're trying to put some pressure on the DCFS attorney to get hers done more quickly. If she doesn't and the judge rules against us (which we've heard he plans to reverse the report), we can claim a mistrial because rules were not followed. We're anxious to get the results. It's been 10 months so I think we've been more than patient. I know God reminded me about the manual being in my bag. It was even opened to the right page. God is still in control, even though some people think they are! We are looking forward to reporting all He has done soon! A big thanks to those who have been praying for us. He is at work!

The closing arguments are finally in as of a week ago Wednesday, the 24th of May. The first statement our attorney made was that the investigator was prejudiced against us because of our Christian faith. Then, he listed all the inadequacies of her investigation and her contradictions as well as the witnesses they called. However, our attorney warned us that if we win and get the girls back, the Cook County guardian will come after us with a vengeance. We're not sure what this means exactly, but we should not have to fear when we've done everything we were supposed to do.

Also, I recently received a letter from Michael Farris, from the Home School Legal Defense. I had written him regarding our constitutional rights having been violated the night the girls were taken. Indeed, they apparently were. There had to have been an emergency or we gave them permission to come in that night, neither of which occurred. We're not sure where we're going to go with that part yet. The judge has the decision in his hands now. He said he could easily do his recommendation within 30 days, probably less. Then, it goes to Springfield for Jess McDonald to give us the final decision. We're hoping and praying it will be done quickly.

The agency called Pastor Tim to arrange a reconciliation meeting about three weeks ago. They had sent us a letter in February, but Pastor Tim couldn't get much response from them after he explained what a reconciliation is. Suddenly, they seemed urgent. Last Thursday we drove to Wheaton, Illinois, where the agency is located. It was a very discouraging three hour meeting, not a reconciliation by any means. It seemed all they wanted was to try to get us to change our minds about fighting for the return of the girls. Their "pastor" was sarcastic, rude, and demeaning to us and Pastor Tim. The director couldn't even tell Pastor Tim why they changed their minds about us being good parents! We confronted them with some of their lies, but the director insisted there weren't any. I told her I have the notes from the hearings to prove it. I will talk further to the two pastors of our church to see what should be done about this man's actions.

We also found out last Friday that the judge has not turned in his recommendation yet. I put in a call to the fair hearing supervisor but haven't heard back from him. I found out yesterday (July 10) that the judge was finally turning his recommendation yesterday or today. I commented to the fair hearing director that apparently the 30 days don't mean anything. He simply replied, "Apparently not." I love the way these people care so much.

Last Thursday (July 6th) the lady who does home visits for the agency decided to pay me a surprise visit. I talked to her through the locked screen door, but never let her inside our home. I couldn't see why she would need to do a surprise visit right now, while our license is still suspended until the hearing decision is reached. I called the Foster Care Alliance to see what she thought. She couldn't think of any possible reason why they would need to do a visit either. I believe it was pure harassment. Next time I won't even answer the door. They never paid a surprise visit the whole four years we were licensed. Our attorney asked them about that during the hearing since they say now they had concerns. Of course, this contradicts the case worker's notes. We will sure be glad when this whole mess is over. It is so wearing on us.

As of August 25, we are still waiting for an answer from DCFS. When I talked to the advocacy office on Tuesday, she claims we will get an answer by the end of the week. We've heard this before so we're not counting on it.

We received a letter today from DCFS stating we now have to file an appeal regarding our license since the agency has recommended they not renew it. Just what we needed, more paperwork and appeals.

We do want to picket the agency if we can get enough people. We've been told this has been effective for other people. It would be a peaceful picket seeking justice and accountability.

Our attorney finally received the report today, September 6th. He faxed us a copy right away. It's half good and half bad. The judge expunged the "torture" charges but kept "substantial risk of harm", even though for very weak reasons. Our attorney says it's a very easy charge to appeal, but it means more paperwork, appeals, and time before the girls are returned to us. Substantial risk of harm is attached to every allegation, just in case they don't get you on the first allegation, I guess. Our attorney told us from the beginning that is probably what the judge would find because of pressure by Patrick Murphy and DCFS. There were many errors in spelling and information. That may work to our advantage during the appeals process. Now, we can go before the Appellate Court, not just the DCFS "fair hearing" judge. We are going to try to change the case to our county, rather than Cook County also. We're hoping this will get rid of Patrick Murphy and Chicago politics. We also have to obtain a new attorney, partly because of strategy and partly because our current one is looking for a different job with a larger law firm. He told us this is necessary because of the recent addition to his family. We're praying for an attorney who can do it pro-bono. We have spent so much money for this case, although many people have contributed also.

We also got good news from the former foster parents from Michigan. The current foster mom has realized the deception and lies told by the agency and DCFS. The foster mom told her that the girls could not have spent 3 1/2 years with us and be the way they are if they were treated as they tried to portray during the hearing. That may also help during the appeals.

We consulted with a new law firm today, September 14th, Lehrer and Redleaf. They are the ones doing the class-action lawsuit against The Child Protection Agency (DCFS) with 170,000 people, of which we are a party. Bob Lehrer believes we have a good case. A perfect case would be 85% because you never know whether you get a good judge. After hearing all the errors made during our fair hearing, he estimates ours to be 75-80%. By the fair hearing judge not allowing testimony from our side after the same subjects had already been discussed by DCFS, it shows a biased judge. Also, the investigator saying she was going to unfound the report until I called to complain to her supervisor indicates retaliation. Of course, the religious discrimination plays a major part as well. It will cost us $10,000-12,000 to fight this battle. We had to pay $300 for a consultation on Thursday, and on Friday, we received an insurance check for $300.04. Somehow, we believe God will provide. Because we are a part of the lawsuit, if the judge awards damages, all attorney's fees will be paid. We have to come up with $2,500 before the attorney can file the appeal, which must be filed before October 1st. We continue to trust God to provide all our needs.

Our new attorneys filed the brief for the appeal on September 29th. DCFS has 35 days to appeal but can ask for an extension. It seems like they can take whatever time they want, but we have time constraints. The paralegal said that sometimes DCFS will back down when they file these appeals. However, we don't really expect them to do it since they have pushed so much thus far.

Our pastors felt compelled to write the agency a lengthy letter confronting them on issues where they handled this situation very wrongly. They should have supported us rather than condemn. They had been invited to our church for a panel on foster parenting but will not be invited back again unless or until they resolve several issues. We continue to pray for this agency and individuals involved in this whole situation.

Since the agency (The Evangelical Child and Family Agency) has recommended DCFS NOT renew our foster care license, we must go to a meeting to argue why we should have our license renewed. This is on December 4. We're praying God will give us a peace and calmness despite the opposition.

We think the meeting went well yesterday, the December 4th. The agency made several points of ways they thought we violated procedures. The most significant and serious accusation was that we gave the youngest girl medication to make her sleep. When we got our turn, I told them how the agency had taken her to the doctor who did an evaluation and prescribed medication to help her sleep. The licensing people looked at the agency representatives and awaited an answer. They had none. The two people from the agency just sat with a puzzled look on their faces. The licensing agent asked us to put some things in writing for their review along with some letters people wrote regarding our character. Two of our pastors attended the meeting with us so one offered to help get it all down just right. They will make a decision about renewing our license once they get this information and documentation.

I talked to our attorney on Tuesday, January 23rd, when he informed me that DCFS said they can't release the transcribed notes from the hearing for two weeks (supposedly some policy). Our attorney had to go into court today to ask the judge to demand that they release the notes immediately. We're praying the judge will get tired of all the excuses and dismiss the case. We know all the delays do not look good for DCFS.

Our attorney finally received the transcribed notes on February 2 after going to court for the judge to demand they be released. The judge wouldn't so this earlier. Our attorney has 35 days to complete his brief.

In the meantime, we're awaiting DCFS's decision regarding the renewal of our foster care license. If they don't, we would have to file yet another appeal. The only reason the agency has for not renewing was several supposed policy violations. Of course, this doesn't make any sense since they always gave us satisfactory marks on the six-month reviews. We're praying the licensing people will see the atrocity of this situation and renew us. We can then work on getting all our files and licensing information transferred to a different agency.

We found out on Tuesday, February 20, that DCFS told the agency to stop all enforcement actions, which means our foster care license will be renewed. All we have left to do is a home visit. It will definitely be awkward with all that has transpired between the agency and us. I will have someone here so, hopefully, they will be intimated enough not to cause any more problems. They were supposed to call this week to set up a visit, but we haven't heard from them yet (over the weekend). The licensing representative said I should call them if they haven't called by Monday, the 26th. We are rejoicing for this victory. It means DCFS believed us, NOT the agency.

Our attorney also sent us his brief on Thursday. It looks very good. The issue he addressed the strongest was that DCFS had already investigated the exact same allegations the previous year, and that investigator reported them "unfounded", showing definite prejudices and retaliation. DCFS policies do not permit this. We're anxious to finally get our day in court and see justice served.

We are still having problems getting the agency to re-license us. As of March 21st, they still have not called to set up a home visit. We did get their Correction Action Plan, which stated we had to go to some training sessions to understand how to discipline following DCFS' standards and how to work as a team. (It would seem they need some training in doing this also.) After talking to the other agency we plan to transfer to after we are re-licensed, she suggested we sign the form since we will be out of their control within the time frame (six months). We sent it back two days ago. When the director of the agency talked to my husband, she referred to the "adoptive parents". We're afraid the girls have been adopted out from under us while we've been steadily fighting the battle to clear our name so we could get them back. It's devastating to think the system has absolutely no integrity. One man I talked to about our situation from DCFS told me that if they fired everyone who lied, there would be no one working for DCFS.

We found out Monday, April 2, that we won the class-action lawsuit against The Child Protection Agency, part of DCFS. This is a huge victory for all of us involved in child care and parents. This means there must be major changes in the way investigations are done. The judge demanded that they make these changes within 60 days, or a mediator will be ordered to help them. We went to the press conference in Chicago today, April 4th. It was encouraging to meet other people who had been through similar nightmares. I'm not sure who all from the press was there, but I'm looking forward to watching the news tonight. We pray this will help children, not only in Illinois, but in other states since investigations are handled in the same way in all states.

As of June 25, we are still waiting for the final arguments to be scheduled for our appellate case. In our attorney's Reply Memorandum, it was very clear that DCFS admitted violating their policies and procedures and law, but their excuse was what they did was their "custom". Some very serious reform needs to be done with this whole corrupt system.

A friend, who has helped other people write books, is helping me write a book. We've been busy collecting information. We're hoping to find a publisher and get it started by the end of the year. I also received a call from a man doing a documentary on the child welfare system. This will come out sometime next year.

When we had the home visit with the new agency, she revealed to me how several of the documents were "doctored" by the former agency to "justify" what they had done. Someone suggested this could very well be illegal. We'll check into it.

We're praying the adoptive mom will allow us to see the girls soon. We have several items we would like to give them. We've been cleaning house and remodeling lately and found several things we believe the girls would like.

We finally had the closing arguments on July 27th. Unfortunately, the judge did not make her final decision, as expected. Our attorney had told us that the judge usually delibertates for 15-20 minutes before making the decision. The judge is not going to give her decision for almost three months, October 23rd. It was so disappointing. We felt very discouraged, but our attorney believes it's a good sign. He has NEVER seen this happen in his many years of handling these cases. It was hard listening to all the lies yet another time. As I sat there feeling like I wanted to run out of the courtroom, I looked up to see "In God We Trust" in big letters on the wall right beside our bench. I just kept repeating that while the lies continued. The difficult part will be if the judge decides to open up the case for another investigation. Our attorney tried very hard to steer her away from that possibility. We're praying that will not be her decision. We can't afford any more attorney fees or continuing the fight. We need to get on with our lives.

In the meantime, we are getting a five-year old foster boy Monday night. This will definitely get our minds off the injustice. Having been free to go out and do whatever we want, it will be a huge change for us to have a little one again. As you can imagine, it was a big adjustment for us when we got the girls. Our "baby" was 17 years old. At least, this time, it will only be one. The licensing person from our new agency told me the other day that the old agency was negligent in putting three badly abused children in our home without giving us much help from the beginning.

As of September 16, we have had our little foster boy for about six weeks. We are doing fine although it definitely has been a big adjustment having a little one to consider when we go places and finding a babysitter. We're praying termination of parental rights will take place on October 5th so we can move to adoption. We're also still praying for God to show us whether we should accept any more foster children. It's still difficult to consider accepting any more children because of the past and being so hurt by the removal of the girls. We have a strong desire to continue working for the needs of foster children and foster parents' rights.

On January 12, 2002, we finally were informed of the appeal decision. We won! The decision actually came on Friday, but our attorney had mistakenly left a message on our daughter's voice mail, which is also our fax number. Our senator is busy trying to set up a meeting with the director of DCFS again. He refused to meet with us until our decision was made. Now, I wonder what excuse he'll use. After two and a half years, we feel like a weight was lifted off our shoulders. We continue to be so thankful for friends and family who believed in us.

Our little boy is adjusting well, although there have been some serious problems to help him. He seems to finally feel that he's safe and opening up a lot about his past. We will continue the battle for rights of foster parents and the children. I was made the Illinois director of The National Foster Parent Coalition for Allegation Reform. I'm also still part of the local Foster Care Alliance. We all want children to be safe, but it is so devastating and destructive to the children to go through such a horrible time.

I was told recently that the DCFS investigator has a reputation for not liking "fanatical" Christians. What a shame to have someone with their prejudices be allowed to harm children! It seems like the movement has been going strong to be careful not to discriminate against races and other religions, but it's acceptable to discriminate against Christians. As long as they get away with it, I guess people will continue. Christians need to stand strong knowing God has helped those who have gone before us and will strengthen us for battle also.

Unfortunately, on February 19th, our attorney called us with bad news - DCFS filed an appeal. He was shocked, as were most of us. With as clear as Judge Arnold's decision was, it seems hard to imagine DCFS filed an appeal. Our attorney suspects they assumed we would not have the funds to continue the fight so could win this round. I don't know how we will get the money, but God can provide. One man in our Sunday School remarked, "Don't they knew who your Father is? He owns a cattle on a thousand hills." Our last decision won't stand unless we continue the fight. Our attorney is giving us a huge discount. He has apologized every time I've talked to him since that day. When I reminded our attorney that we were re-licensed and have had a foster child since July, he further remarked that it was even clearer that this was retaliation and harrassment. Our agency believes it might be partly because we've been so political and public. DCFS is trying to "save face."

We received a letter on May 7th, 2002, from the Central Registry in Springfield saying our names have been cleared from the child abuse list. We're not sure what to think of this yet and are waiting for our attorney to get back to us with his thoughts.

We finalized the adoption of our foster son today, October 29, 2002! We were concerned thatt DCFS might try to find a way to prevent us from adopting him.

We are still waiting for word from our attorney that DCFS has responded with their appeal. We think that may not occur until the election and those people take office in January. Someone must realize what a huge mistake they have made. It's the same old story we've heard all along, passing the buck to someone else. I'm anxious to fax the adoption papers to our attorney so he can make certain people aware of it.

On March 14th, I received a letter from Governor Blagojevich's office asking for a three-page brief with five specific issues he wanted me to address. I had just that afternoon to put it together since it took a week for me to get the letter. After talking to a couple of people, I sat down at the computer to write. I was excited to have this opportunity to help the Task Force make the changes so drastically needed for the benefit of Illinois' children as well as those of us who care for them.

Our attorney called us on March 19th stating that the state will probably wait for the five years to expire, which is August of 2004. They will not respond even though they were the ones who started the appeal. I was not happy to think that this case will not be over for another year and a half. Another problem I see with this system - we have deadlines. Apparently, they do not. Our attorney also told me that he has never represented a client where the state continued the fight when they have re-licensed the people, given them a foster child, allowed them to adopt him, and the private agency still asks for us to foster other children, do respite care, etc.

The state's attorney's office put an appeal at the very last minute on January 19, 2003. Without any more money available to spend on our court case, we had to let it go this time. We had a difficult struggle coming to this decision. The court justice sided with the administrative law judge, not even taking into consideration the Cook County Judge's decision. It was very disturbing. However, we continue to advocate for foster parents and the children. In December of 2003, we took in two foster children from a large family. They are doing well. Even though we will never be the same trusting people with this system, we use our knowledge and compassion to help others. Life has its rewards. God is good all the time.

April 22, 2006 - Some people asked me to update my site so I will tell you what has happened in the last three years. We took some time off from foster care while we helped our adopted son adjust. He had a lot of difficulties with abandonment issues. He is doing well now. I am home schooling him and have since he was in first grade.

In December of 2003, we accepted twins, a boy and a girl, who were with us for a little less than a year. We accepted two sisters, 12 and 6 in July of 2004. We thought it was temporary, but as anyone in foster care knows, it often turns into more time than expected. They would have been with us for two years in July, but the oldest ran away about two weeks ago. She decided we were too strict and wanted to be with her birth dad. We had to keep taking away privileges because of her behavior. She was in a lot of trouble in school too. Since the girls have different dads, the youngest one is still with us. We'll see what happens at the next court date in June. The 7-year old seems to be doing well in spite of her sister leaving. Having a grandson who will be 2 years old in August, we've decided not to do more foster care. I want to advocate more for foster parents, lobbying for changes in the system that will benefit children and their caregivers.

It's the end of September, and we still do not have a court date to start the termination of parental rights for our eight-year old foster daughter. Sometimes it gets quite discouraging at how slow the system is. The guardian came this week so I let her know how strongly we feel about this little girl needing permanency. We may continue to do respite care after the adoption is completed, but we've decided it's just too frustrating to wait for the system to complete permanency for children. We've been told that if we speak up too much, we run the chance of losing our foster daughter. It's so difficult to sit back and not speak up at times. We continue to pray for God's guidance about how we can be used once we accomplish our goal of adoption. I do still help people do their administrative hearings. I totally enjoy encouraging people to fight for what is right.

As of February 15, 2008, we are in the midst of adopting a 9-year old girl we've had for three and a half years. We've been told to lay low and not advocate too much until our foster daughter is officially adopted. Therefore, we are not taking any more children. I want to be able to do some lobbying for the foster care system. Even though there are many rules and policies, DCFS doesn't adhere to them far too often. I continue to talk to one or two people a week reporting false allegations for a scratch or something all children receive many times in their lives. The only way to prevent such injuries is to keep them in a bubble. Why can't foster children be as much like children as possible under the circumstances? It's difficult enough for them to be taken away from birth parents who are the ones they are supposed to be able to count on to protect them. The law in Illinois says foster children are supposed to receive permanency within 12-15 months. We know that doesn't take place more often than it does. I desire to have the voice to help children and those of us who care for them so laws are obeyed and children don't continue to suffer in long-term foster care. They do deserve permanency. Please feel free to e-mail me at Viam48@Yahoo.com

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