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I think it depends on the age of the child, and the behavior of the bioparents.
We have negotiated an agreement with the biomom of our group; the older two children frequently lived with her until they were 5 & 6 and they are very connected to her. Actually, I think they are just worried about her most of the time. Anyway, we have agreed to phone calls every fourth month & visits every fourth month (contact of one type or the other every other month, alternating phone & in person); no contact of any kind on their birthdays or on holidays; and letters from her as often as once a month. We even limited the amount she can spend on them for gifts. She has to contact us to set up the time, etc, for the contact so if she doesn't contact us there will be no phone call or visit.
She never signed the agreement, and the adoption is not final yet but we are using it as a guide for contact. At this time she has always been appropriate with the children and she lives in another state - about 20 hours away - so we're allowing phone calls every other month. We can stop contact altogether any time she is not appropriate and the contract (even if she had signed it) is not legally enforceable but I believe the two older children would really struggle if they were denied contact with her.
Our youngest child is only a toddler so the whole thing doesn't mean much to him, except he gets to talk on the speaker phone which is kind of neat!
The kids have an aunt who had actually raised the older two most of their lives; she is still very involved with us, and we have "adopted" her and her child as part of our family. She made the decision not to adopt the children so we could, and she has been wonderful! The only problem we have is that the older two still look to her as the person they will mind, etc., and when we are all together that gets annoying. She's been good about it and I know it's not her fault nor her problem. We don't have a formal agreement about contact with her but have worked out a relationship where the children still have her as their aunt and she gets to spoil them but isn't the parent figure anymore! She does most of the babysitting we need and that is helpful, too.
Only you know what you are willing to do but the contact can be helpful. Our oldest son had no contact with biomom (and doesn't want any now) but when he was struggling with puberty we had alot of trouble dealing with his "fantasy family"; I believe if he'd had contact with biomom there would have been nothing to fantasize about!
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