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Originally Posted by Hadley2
Ohio state and federal law REQUIRE that adoption MUST be the first "option" that is, permanency goal, recommended if RU fails. TPR and adoption are a child's right. Children have a right to a safe, legally secure, and permanent home. Yet you say it's not even considered. Your post shows that your training led you to think that you weren't even allowed to discuss adoption? That you had to ask permission? Surely these clear contradictions show that something is deeply wrong with how the cases are handled in your area.
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I have not personally been assigned to a case where reunification fails, so of course adoption would not be considered if the child is going home. I'm still learning and each case is a new learning experience. However, I am a paralegal and have worked for lawyers for years and the majority of the cases i have worked on have ended in legal custody or reunification. That might just be a statistical thing. Maybe the permanent custody cases are much rarer and then given to attorney GALs - not CASAs. When I worked for an attorney GAL, he had more PC (or what you call RU) cases. In those situations, the legal rights are going to need to be protected and CASAs are not supposed to be protecting legal rights - only best interests-so it would make sense that an attorney GAL would be assigned (unless the CASA had the case from the beginning which then the CASA would stay on and an attorney for the child might be assigned). I'm sure there is a lot of room for improvement for Attorney GALs - they are a whole other breed and don't take the time that the CASAs do to ferret out the case in order to make the best recommendations. This is a real problem i've seen and i'm sure it is not unique to my area. Some attorney GALs are not doing a thorough investigation and not having enough information to make an informed recommendation. I always tell relatives and foster parents to bombard the GALs with letters and documentation so they will have something in their file and in their hands when they write recommendations, that would include any intent to adopt. Send letters, make phone calls, do whatever you can to make it known to both the caseworker and the GAL that you want to adopt because reunification is the goal until the parents rights are severed, which takes a long time in most cases. Hadley, it sounds like you know alot more about RU (PC) cases than I do but I don't think legal custody is unique to our area. I think it happens all over the state instead of severing rights, and maybe that is where the loophole to the law you are referring to comes into play. It sounds like after rights are terminated, that is a whole other area that I have not been exposed to as of yet, but I am looking forward to learning more about it.