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Home > News

House Passes Protecting Incentives for the Adoption of Children with Special Needs Act Chairman McDermott Manages Debate

April 29, 2009

“The bipartisan bill eliminates a restriction that was inadvertently placed in the adoption incentive program by the Omnibus Appropriations Act of 2009.”

Rep. Jim McDermott (D-WA), Income Security and Family Support Subcommittee Chairman, managed House floor responsibility today for the passage of S. 735, the Protecting Incentives for the Adoption of Children with Special Needs Act of 2009.

The bill, which passed today in the House on the Suspension Calendar, removes a restriction that was mistakenly added in the Omnibus Appropriations Act of 2009 that would have reduced the amount of funding received by States that are able to increase the number of children adopted out of foster care.

Mr. McDermott’s remarks:

Mr. Speaker, last fall Congress passed bipartisan legislation that provided broad improvements to our nation’s child welfare system. 
 
The legislation, the Fostering Connections to Success and Increasing Adoptions Act, won unanimous approval in both the House and the Senate last fall and was signed into law a short time later. 

The landmark legislation represented the most significant reform in the child welfare system in over a decade. 
 
Among the provisions of the Fostering Connections to Success and Increasing Adoptions Act was the reauthorization and improvement of the Adoption Incentives Program. 

To encourage and reward States for increasing the number of children who are able to leave the public foster care system for a safe, permanent and loving adoptive home, Congress established the Adoptions Incentives program in1997, as part of the Adoption and Safe Families Act. 

The Adoption Incentives program provides States with financial incentives for increasing, above a certain specific baseline, the number of adoptive families for children in foster care, particularly for those with disabilities or other special needs, and for older youth

The bill under consideration, the Protecting Incentives for the Adoption of Children with Special Needs Act of 2009, will ensure that the improvements made to the Adoption Incentives program last fall are implemented as Congress intended. 
 
The bipartisan bill eliminates a restriction that was inadvertently placed in the adoption incentive program by the Omnibus Appropriations Act of 2009.

The Omnibus Appropriations bill included a provision that required the Department of Health and Human Services, or HHS, to pay adoption incentives payments awarded for fiscal year 2008 in the same manner as they were awarded in previous years. 
 
The provision was prior to changes being made to the program by the Fostering Connections to Success and Increasing Adoptions Act. 

The bill before us simply eliminates the provision included in the Omnibus Appropriations bill, thereby allowing HHS to base upcoming award payments on the new criteria established by last fall’s bipartisan child welfare legislation.

Removing the inadvertent provision will ensure that newly reauthorized and improved Adoption Incentives program is operated as intended by Congress.