A Message from the Director . . .

Over the last few weeks we have all watched with concern the events in Haiti.  Much of this attention has been focused on the children. The long term relationship between this country and Haiti in finding families for orphaned children explains the level of concern we've seen expressed.

I recently spent some time on a conference call with the State Department, Health and Human Services, Homeland Security and the Immigration and Naturalization Service to hear about the status of orphaned children in Haiti. As you can imagine, things are very chaotic and the challenge to meet basic needs is great.

These agencies have established priorities to address the concern about the status of orphaned children in the following manner:

• The priority is with those children whose adoptive process was already complete.  Many of these adoptive parents were with their children in Haiti at the time the earthquake hit.  Though these adoptions were complete, families were waiting for VISA’s or other document necessary to leave the country.
• The second priority was with those children who had been matched with parents but were not in Haiti with their children.

In both cases the focus of the US agencies is to make sure parents are actually who they claim to be and have been determined to be qualified to adopt.  At time of crisis, children are often at great risk from people who want to do them harm.  The US Agencies are working hard to protect children as well as help unite them with their parents.

At this time no other children are being allow to leave the country and the United Nations Children's  Fund (UNICEF) is working to establish safe locations in Haiti for children who are without a family member or adult to care for them.  We have been told that any children who have been transported to the US without prior authorization will be placed in the Undocumented Minors Program.

We are not anticipating that there will be a need for Americans to open their homes to these children or that there will be a significant number of Haitian children who will become available for adoption.

If you are interested in more specific information please contact Susan Hendershot, Family Services Coordinator, at 620-272-0010 or This e-mail address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it .