West Virginia SB300 restrictive OBC access: Bastardette’s personal letter to Senate Judiciary–please vote NO!

SB300 is currently in the West Virginia Senate Judiciary Committee. This is a restrictive OBC access bill that mandates adoptee educational requirements to receive their OBC. It also contains redaction language that authorizes the state, upon request of a birthparent, to black-out their identifying information, before it is released to the adoptee. (also see 2019 BN Legislative Watch page. 

Please write–especially if you have a West Virginia connection– to the  JudiciaryCommittee and voice your objections to the bill. Ask them to VOTE NO

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Below is my personal letter

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I write today to voice my displeasure with the current version of SB300–a supposed adoptee rights bill that restores the right of Original Bith Certificate (OBC) access to some, but not all, West Virginia adoptees. Unfortunately, this bill falls far from the mark and should be defeated or left to die in committee.

• Contains a corrupt Contact Preference Form (CPF) that enables the state to redact birthparent identification information upon request of a birthparent.

No one, not even a parent, has the legal authority to deny the release of or the defacement of the state-held record of another person’s birth. A genuine CPF is simply an information tool. It is nothing more than a statement of preference, voluntarily submitted by a birthparent and with no legal binding.  The genuine CPA/preference has no impact on the release of the intact, unvandalized OBC to the adoptee. 

 

Regarding birthparent anonymity:  Identifying information about surrendering parents often appears in court documents given to adoptive parents who can at any point give that information to the adopted person. (In some states adoptive parents, at the time of adoption finalization, can petition the court to keep the record open.) The names of surrendering parents are published in legal ads. Courts can open “sealed records” for “good cause.” Critically, the OBC is sealed at the time of adoption finalization, not surrender. If a child is not adopted, the record is never sealed. If a child is adopted, but the adoption is overturned or disrupted, the OBC is unsealed.  

 

Moreover, inexpensive DNA tests have made the idea of anonymity in adoption null.

My awesome great grandfather William Lewis Reese. And no, I did not include this picture with my email.

I am an Ohio adoptee whose records were never sealed so I have no real dog in this fight.  My birthfather’s family, however, has deep roots in West Virginia arriving in what was then Virginia, in the 18th century. Most settled in what is now the Wood-Upshur-Lewis-Kanawha County area  (Dallison. Linger Run/Creek, Hacker’s Creek settlement, Volcano, and of course, Parkersburg and  Charleston),  Many still live in those areas (Reese, Linger, Hacker, Hedrick, Harrison, Bowen, Sandy, McNemer, Hinzman, Kemper.) These are big families, and I’d bet the bank I have unknown adopted cousins out there who would love the right to their birth record restored. Who knows? I may even be related to current members of the legislature. So, in a sense, my dog is barking.

West Virginia has a long history of independence, and I am proud of my West Virginia heritage. Please make me prouder by amending SB300 to be a genuine and inclusive OBC access bill that does not discriminate against the state’s adoptees for any reason. Or let it die by whatever means necessary.

Thank you.

Yours truly.

Marley Greiner