Adoption agencies are licensed by the State of
Birthparents may relinquish a child to an adoption agency and
the agency can then place the child with adoptive parents. Often the
birthparents will be involved with the agency in selecting the adoptive
parents.
Agencies differ in their emphasis of adoption programs as well
as types of adoptive parents and birthparents that they work with. Some
agencies have religious affiliations, others do not. Some only do domestic
placements, others do only international placements, and some adoption agencies
offer services for all types of adoptions. Some agencies are involved with the
An attorney is usually not involved in an agency adoption until
after the child is placed and the agency is ready to have the adoptive parents
file the Petition for Adoption in the Circuit Court. After you have been placed
with a child, I will file the Petition for Adoption on your behalf.
To file a Petition for Adoption, I first will need to receive
certain documents from the placing agency. These will include: a copy of your
current homestudy, Consents to Adoption and Certificate of Irrevocability
signed by the birthparent(s), and the child’s medical and genetic history. The
Consent to Adoption issued by the placing agency may be submitted to me at the
time I am preparing the Petition for Adoption, but some agencies choose to file
this document along with the post-placement report at a later date. If the
child is adopted from outside the State of
I will have the Petition for Adoption prepared within a few days
of my receiving the papers from the agency. You will then need to sign the
Petition for Adoption in my office, or if you so choose, I can mail the
documents to you for you to sign in front of a local Notary Public and then
return the papers to my office. The Petition will then be filed in Circuit
Court and copies will be sent to the Oregon Department of Human Services. The
placing adoption agency will then file a Report to the Court regarding your
(post-placement) adjustment to adopting a child. When this is done, the Decree
of Adoption is submitted for the judge to sign. You may choose to have the
Decree signed and sent to you in the mail or ask the Court Clerk to schedule an
Adoption Decree signing ceremony.
After the Decree of Adoption is signed, you will receive a new
Birth Certificate from the state where the child was born, showing the child as
being born to you, with the name you have chosen for the child.