Adoption Status-Help Please

As I'm sure you can imagine, the status of Conleigh's adoption (and hundreds of other children who were in process) is very uncertain. Most of the paperwork for adoptions is processed in Port Au Prince. No one has any idea of if the buildings where those papers were stored are even still standing. Like everything else in Haiti, the Haitian adoption process changed the moment the earthquake hit. There are groups working on solutions but we have no idea what those will look like and it will take some time to find out. One of the problems is that even though these children are being adopted by Americans, they are still Haitian citizens. Many of these children have birth parents who will be unable to be located to vouch for their desire for their children to be adopted. At any rate, it is being suggested that we contact our elected representatives in Washington and ask them to advocate on our behalf and for the sake of our children. What I would ask is that you would contact several people and relay the following information:

As you know, many children in Haiti come to the US every year through legal adoptions. Prior to the horrific earthquake this week, many US families had committed to children in Haiti as adoptive families. These families are at various stages in the process, some almost at the end and waiting for USCIS approval and visas, some in the middle and legal parents of their children under the Haitian law, and some more towards the beginning but nevertheless committed to their child. Even for some of those who are still towards the beginning of the process, they have been in process for lengthly amounts of time including some who have been in process for well over a year. These families are no doubt concerned that their children in Haiti will not have access to shelter, food, water and medical care should it be needed. They also are concerned that the massive amounts of families devastated by the earthquake will need services that the orphanages could be providing but will be unable to, as many are already operating at capacity. We ask for you to personally advocate for these families and their children, to help the State Department and Haitian officials work together to find an efficient and creative way to help these families in process bring their children home.

You may certainly copy this letter directly from my email. You may change it if you wish and include information about us personally.

You can use this site to find out your Senator's contact information. http://www.senate.gov/general/contact_information/senators_cfm.cfm

You may also contact your own representative to the House. Another avenue might be to contact Bill Clinton as he is a special envoy to Haiti. I don't know what address for sure to reach him at.

Thank you for taking the time to help us out. Up to this point, I think I've been pretty calm about the whole adoption issue but as I have had to write all this out, worry certainly starts to creep in. Please pray for our ability to be free from anxiety and worry as we wait for new of what will happen with our adoption.