Indiana Leads Nation in Foster Care Adoptions
Assistant Secretary at HHS’s Administration for Families and Children Lynn Johnson presents Gov. Holcomb with a $4.7 million Adoption and Legal Guardianship Incentive Award.
INDIANAPOLIS – Illustrating yet another way that Indiana is setting nationwide trends as a pro-life state, Governor Holcomb announced today that Indiana leads the nation in the number of foster children who find forever families through adoption.
In 2019, 2,489 children were adopted through Indiana’s Department of Child Services (D.C.S.) from the foster care system. This represents more than twice the number of foster care adoptions that took place in Indiana in 2015, indicating how strong the culture of life is in our state, as well as the leadership of Governor Holcomb and D.C.S Director Terry Stigdon.
“You all in Indiana are working hard to promote a culture of life by focusing on adoptions and child welfare,” said Lynn Johnson, Assistant Secretary at the Department of Health and Human Services’s Administration for Families and Children. Assistant Secretary Johnson was on hand representing the Trump administration, as they awarded Indiana a $4.7 million Adoption and Legal Guardianship Incentive Award for our state’s work to increase adoptions.
Out of the 49 states participating in the incentive program, Indiana was #1 in our increase in adoptions from foster care. This increase is in part due to the pro-life and pro-adoption ethic that prevails in Indiana, but also because of several concrete steps taken by Governor Holcomb at the beginning of his administration.
Governor Holcomb put a priority on child welfare, and particularly on foster care adoptions by creating the first-ever adoption unit within D.C.S. This has allowed the department to add staff regionally whose sole focus is on assisting family case managers with finding permanent homes for children when parental rights have been terminated. In addition, Director Stigdon has more than doubled the number of adoption
Dept. of Child Services Director Terry Stigdon announces that Indiana has more than doubled the number of foster care adoptions over the last four years.
consultants in Indiana from seven to 19 and provided specialized training. The agency also launched an enhanced database for better tracking of adoption inquiries and a digital picture book of Indiana’s Waiting Children.
There is a myth being promulgated by abortion advocates, that some children are unwanted. As we continue to promote the respect for all human life from conception to natural death, Right to Life of Indianapolis is ecstatic over the prospects of these children who have found forever homes. Each one of them is reminder that no child is truly unwanted. We as a state and those of us in Central Indiana, are generous enough and loving enough to want and welcome all children, no matter their circumstances or the circumstances of their parents. This is the pro-life way.
Click here to watch Gov. Holcomb’s press conference with D.C.S. Director Terry Stigdon and HHS Asst. Secretary Lynn Johnson.