Pat Marler writes a response to the North Carolina Coalition for Adoption Reform’s decision to replace it’s open records bill with a Confidential Intermediary system proposal which makes adoption agencies the gatekeeper of adoptee information. Bastardette will be posting her own comments about the amended bill today or tomorrow.
Dear Roberta,
As a Co-Chair of Oklahoma’s open record organization, OORAH, Inc., I know about the Confidential Intermediary Program instituted in Oklahoma in 1997. confidential intermediary related to me that the CI Program has been a failure and I’ve heard from other states, like Illinois, that theirs is a failure too.
Adoptees complain it isn’t fair the state charges a fee, and feel it’s a “rip-off.” Even though the CI program reunites them, it does not give them the right to their records. They still have to petition the court to get any birth documents.
The CI system is a “bone” thrown to adoptees; with the state saying “you are not capable of taking care of your own relationships, you are still a child under our authority–forever.”
I resent this kind of attitude from the state. I hope you do, too.
Pat Marler.
Co-Chair, Oklahomans for Open Records and Adoption Honesty
Pat is also a member of the Bastard Nation Executive Commititee and is BN’s treasurer.