[5starday]

We just recently finalized the adoption our little A, who was a foster child. We wanted to give our family a chance to be a family without the monthly home visits, etc... We are also in the process of building a new home, which we do not expect to be finished until the end of this year (if we are lucky!). We figured after we moved to our new home, we could get a new approval from the state on the new home and then consider another case. We didn't think it would be fair to any child or anyone in our current family to take a case now when our lives are so hectic and incredibly busy.

Our license is supposed to renew in June. We were asked by our agency to suspend our license until we are certain we are going to take another case. We wanted to keep our license in force since it took nearly 6 months to get it in the first place. We were told it was because of budget reasons and that the agency only receives money from the state for active participants in the foster program. Basically, it comes down to a lack of money to "monitor" our home on a quarterly basis.

To be honest, I was kind of offended. My husband and I have personally donated money to this organization (that had nothing to do with our fostering), as we have done every year for the past 3 years.

My fear is that if we go along with it, something will change at the beginning of 2008 and won't allow us to reclaim our license.

Has anyone ever been asked this?

[5starday]

The fact that not one person responded to this is alarming to me. Does this mean that nobody else has been asked to do this?

I am hesitant to agree to it, but feel as if we are being strong-armed into either agreeing to suspend our license or take another case right now.

We just finalized the adoption in December for our little A, and that took nearly 2 years for a case they called a "no brainer." We not only want time to live our lives as a family without the DES/CPS monthly scrutiny, but also want to wait until our new home is built to bring another child into our crazy world.

Does anyone think this is odd?

[Rebecca G.]

We had a similar issue. We were told that once we were approved they would not give us a liscense until placement. And I was given the same reason.

[leenab]

At our request the state put our home on hold, not our liscence. It meant that we were still liscenced we just didn't receive calls unless it was for straight adoption. We did this when we decided to go straight adoption, and once our 3rd son was placed with us we put our home on hold again so that he had a chance to settle in. We adopted him on Thursday and are debating as to whether we'll request to have the hold removed or just go ahead and close our home.

I have heard that some states have rules that to remain a foster parent/keep your liscence you have to have a child in placement for so many days out of the year or so many placements a year.

-Leena