July to December 2005 from the JCICS Files

July 12, 2005
Russia
Coming off of a Russian adoptee death in North Carolina, JCICS was starting a strong push to deflect attention away from this, and market families who are doing well. Further efforts will be revealed in later board meeting notes.

August 9, 20052005 Angels in Adoption DinnerThe push to influence Russia continued when they voted to give 4 of their 8 tickets to the “Russian delegation.” Their second choice was for those tickets to go to the Russian Consulate; third choice was the Guatemala Consulate.

October 7, 2005New Directors As they looked to add new directors to the board, the top three issues that they cared about were:

“1. Committed to give the time

2. Diversity (ethnic, geographic, role in organization)

3. Strong, well-connected person in the business community and government, PR skills “

There was nothing about due diligence, knowledge of foreign countries, or social work mentioned. It was all very political, as was the reality of their work.

ComplaintsAdditionally, they revealed their complaints and (lack of real) consequences:

“JCICS has received 20 total complaints over 2 years. 8 total have been considered by the review committee (others did not meet criteria to be reviewed). 2 agencies received a letter regarding improving their practices.”

“Discussion occurred regarding the effectiveness of the Complaint Policy. Standards may not be strong enough to make enforcing them an easy task. Most cases seem to be an instance of the word of the agency against the parents, and as a result are difficult to judge.”

December 13, 2005Collaborations – COA and Others Meetings surrounding Hague accreditations started to occur. The Council on Accreditation (COA) was and still is the national accreditation body for the Hague. You should note that the JCICS was a sponsor http://www.coanet.org/front3/page.cfm?sect=12, and Tom Difilipo, president of the JCICS, was and still is on the Board of Trustees of the COA http://www.coanet.org/files/BoardMembers.pdf.

Yes, you read that correctly. The JCICS paid to sponsor the COA, plus the head of JCICS is on the Board of Trustees that in turn lowers the fee rate that agencies pay to get accreditation (and also has unknown amounts of influence over who gets accredited). What a shocking conflict of interest!

The meeting notes read as follows: ”Ways that JCICS and COA can work together were also discussed. Also discussed was the JCICS becoming a sponsoring organization. Sponsoring organizations receive a 25% percent discount on accreditation fees for all of their members, and this would continue under Hague accreditation. COA had their Board meeting this past Saturday and they were going to discuss the requirements to become a sponsoring organization (currently it is approximately $7,000 a year; CWLA and NCFA are both sponsoring organizations). They were going to discuss reducing or waiving the annual fee. If the 25% discount does continue under the Hague, it is imperative that JCICS become a sponsoring organization.”

Costs and the politics of who else is sponsoring COA appear to be greater concerns than following the new regulations.

Also discussed was a collaboration with the Evan B. Donaldson Institute as well as with Senator Mary Landrieu. The connection with Senator Landrieu will become more apparent over time as you will see the Families For Orphan Act unfold. (See http://pear-now.blogspot.com/search/label/Families%20for%20Orphans%20Act for a history of this legislation).

Romania
The curtains were slightly opened on some of the Romanian children who had been referred before Romania closed—these are the children that the “pipeline” families were still waiting to adopt.

“Ms. Iosiper confirmed what JCICS already knows about the 101 families who were called by the State Department at the end of November. 94 cases were denied because they were re-integrated into biological families. 7 cases were adopted by biological grandparents or were adopted by American families who had been living in Romania for several years. Other countries around the world also received similar information regarding their pipeline cases of adoption from Romania.”

And

“The government has denied all pipeline cases.”

JCICS dryly and negatively reported these 101 positive resolutions of reintegration or domestic adoptions. Shouldn’t we all care about the best interests of the children?Romanian adoption irregularities are catalogued here: http://www.brandeis.edu/investigate/gender/adoption/romania.html.

Russia
Discussions about their annual conference and who they wanted to invite occurred. “A psychologist who is adopting from Russia has some contacts in Moscow. They include an attorney who places children, an orphanage director, a family court judge, and a federal judge. She would like to pay for some or all of them to attend and possibly present at the upcoming annual conference.” Paying judges and orphanage directors was what they discussed.

India
Their response to a decrease in placements was not to question why but to use muscle. “Placements have dropped approximately 20% over the last few months. It may be time for JCICS to write a letter to CARA,” they admitted.

When Member Organizations Get Sued…
“[A] JCICS member organization is being sued by an adoptive family. JCICS may be called to serve as a witness in the trial to take place in March 2006. Meghan has contacted the JCICS attorney to become aware of what procedures JCICS needs to be aware of. It is unknown at this time who will testify on behalf of JCICS, or if we will testify at all.”

Ouch!

To read the complete minutes:

July http://poundpuplegacy.org/files/jcics/July%2012,%202005%20Minutes.pdf

August http://poundpuplegacy.org/files/jcics/August%209,%202005%20Minutes.pdf

October http://poundpuplegacy.org/files/jcics/October%20JCICS%20BOD%20Minutes_WEB.doc

December http://poundpuplegacy.org/files/jcics/December%2013%202005%20Minutes_Final.doc

For all 2005-2009 meeting minutes, see http://poundpuplegacy.org/node/46329.

REFORM Puzzle Piece