Bill to extend adoption subsidies to 21 could save D.C. millions, study finds

Cutoff age would be the same as for foster children

A report by the District's chief financial officer has found that the city would save millions of dollars by extending the subsidy it provides to people who become legal guardians or adoptive parents of foster children.

Unlike the District's subsidies to foster families, which can continue until the child is 21, aid to legal guardians and adoptive parents typically ends when the child turns 18, even if he or she is still in school.

In a city with more than 2,000 children in foster care, the disparity has been an obstacle to finding permanent homes for the hundreds of foster children who are not expected to return to their birth families, advocates and officials say.

Many foster parents have modest incomes, and the subsidy is essential if they are to raise the children, advocates say. But it also can create an incentive to keep a child in foster care until he is 21.

Child welfare advocates have been pushing for a change, and a federal law enacted last year will give states the option of using federal funding to continue subsidies to 21.

In September, D.C. Council member Michael A. Brown (I-At Large) introduced a bill that would extend the adoption and guardianship subsidies in the District to 21.

Since then, the chief financial officer's office has been analyzing the bill, projecting how much the change would cost the Child and Family Services Agency and how much it would save CFSA and other city agencies.

In a fiscal impact statement issued this week, Chief Financial Officer Natwar M. Gandhi said extending the subsidy would require an initial -- and as yet unbudgeted -- investment of $500,000 to reprogram CFSA's information technology systems.

The city expects that half that expense would be reimbursed by the federal government, making the projected net cost $250,000.

But Gandhi's 16-page analysis says the city would save almost $4 million in just the first four years.

Although the savings at CFSA would be significant, $1.5 million during that time, the biggest reduction would come in educational expenditures.

Hundreds of District foster children live with families in neighboring counties, and the District pays those jurisdictions at least $12,000 a child for schooling, with higher costs for special education students.

Once a child is placed in a permanent home out of state, either through adoption or guardianship, the District is no longer responsible for education costs. Over the four-year period, the District would save more than $2 million in school payments, the report projects.

Council member Tommy Wells, (D-Ward 6), chairman of the human services committee, said Tuesday that he expects to introduce a broader adoption bill next month and that he plans to roll Brown's bill, the Adoption and Guardianship Expansion Act of 2009, into that legislation. Wells said he thinks the council and CFSA will be able to find the $500,000 needed for reprogramming the agency's computer system.

Brown, who sits on the human services committee, said the money will be well spent.

"I can't imagine with those kind of saving numbers . . . that anyone will resist," he said.