Conn. seeks LGBT families to adopt, foster

Move is bucking a trend in some states to curtail such adoptions

WEST HARTFORD, Conn. — Connecticut’s child welfare agency has launched an initiative to actively recruit members of the state’s LGBT community to become foster and adoptive parents, bucking recent efforts in some states to curtail gay adoptions.

Democratic Gov. Dannel P. Malloy said Thursday that Connecticut wants to be known as a state that welcomes and embraces the LGBT community, especially considering there are 4,300 children in state care and about half of them likely won’t return to their biological families.

“We have to get more of our children placed with our families in our state,” Malloy said.

The Connecticut Department of Children and Families’ new outreach campaign is one of a handful of efforts by state and city governments across the U.S. to encourage gays and lesbians to become adoptive or foster parents. There are similar initiatives in New York City and San Francisco.

Alison Delpercio, the Human Rights Foundation’s deputy director of children, youth and families program, said she has seen such recruitment efforts mostly at a county level or from private agencies. She said it’s unusual for a large statewide system to take a proactive approach.

Connecticut’s department plans to work with gay and lesbian organizations and LGBT community centers to encourage people to apply to become parents. DCF Commissioner Joette Katz said there are roughly 100 LGBT adoptive families already in the state’s system. She said she wants to increase that number to at least 250 by January, when Malloy’s term expires.

“There are hundreds, if not thousands, of families that have a lot of love to give,” she said, noting a 2013 study by the Williams Institute at UCLA School of Law that found same-sex couples are four times more likely than different-sex couples to raise an adopted child and six times more likely to raise foster children.

While there’s no official, upto-date count of gay and lesbian adoptive parents, advocates say the number is on the rise.

The Kansas Legislature this year passed legislation that prevents barring faith-based agencies from providing adoption or foster care services for the state because the agencies won’t place children in homes that violate their “sincerely held” religious beliefs. Republican Gov. Jeff Colyer is expected to sign it into law. Derided by LGBT rights advocates, the bill was backed by the state’s Catholic bishops and conservative groups.

The Oklahoma Legislature overwhelmingly approved a similar bill, granting legal protections to faith-based adoption agencies that won’t place children in LGBT homes.

Efforts to place restrictions on gay adoptions have dissuaded some in the LGBT community from trying to become foster or adoptive parents, said Shannon Smith, who adopted two young brothers in DCF care with his husband Ross Stencil about six years ago. He said that’s why it’s important for Connecticut to reach out to families.