In a split decision, the Commonwealth Court reversed the DPW’s decision.
“The panel majority issued a sweeping decision striking down the Adoption Opportunities Act to the extent it requires that a child be in the legal custody of local authorities to be eligible for adoption assistance payments,” Castille said.
The Commonwealth Court majority found that the state statute conflicted with the federal act because the federal act does not limit adoption assistance for children in the legal custody of a county. The majority therefore invalidated the state act on federal pre-emption grounds.
But Castille said the Supreme Court found the dissent of then President Judge James Gardner Colins to be the more persuasive argument. Castille said the justices “had no difficulty” finding that the Commonwealth Court majority erred.
He quoted several paragraphs from Colins’ dissent explaining why there is no “unavoidable tension between the two acts.” Colins said both the terms of the federal statute and its history only intend to provide assistance to children in state custody.
“The federal law refers to a state’s ‘placement’ of a ‘foster child’ for adoption and requires that the state agency determine that the child cannot be placed for adoption because of specified factors and/ or conditions, after the agency has made an unsuccessful effort to place the child with adoptive parents,” Colins said in his dissent.
Castille said the high court was of the same opinion, finding even more evidence for the result.
“Equally compelling is the fact that Congress expressly allowed the states participating in the federal program leeway to determine themselves, within certain broad parameters, which children have special needs and are therefore eligible for adoption assistance subsidies; the granting of such leeway hardly reveals an intent to restrict the states in the procrustean fashion that the Commonwealth Court panel majority concluded,” Castille said.
The General Assembly’s definition of a special-needs child, in part, as one who is in state agency custody is consistent with the federal act, Castille said.
“That definition ensures that federal subsidies will be available where the need is greatest – i.e., to children who are the most difficult to place in adoptive homes,” Castille said.
“It was entirely reasonable for the General Assembly to conclude that those children actually involved in the state foster care system, and who also have designated special needs, are the most difficult to place. It was equally as reasonable for the General Assembly to conclude that private adoption agencies placing children are less likely to face a shortage of prospective parents ready, willing and financially able to adopt children, including special needs children.”
Eligibility
However, the justices concluded that, even though the Commonwealth Court’s decision invalidating the state act was in error, the petitioners were still entitled to adoption assistance.
Rather than prolonging the case by remanding it to the Commonwealth Court for resolution of the petitioners’ non-constitutional issues to determine eligibility, Castille said, the high court would take care of those arguments.
Looking at the totality of the circumstances, Castille said, it was clear that R.R.M. was or should have been in the legal custody of DHS so as to satisfy the requirements of the Adoption Opportunities Act.
“This case does not resemble a private adoption in the least; rather, R.R.M. unquestionably began in agency custody, was placed in the foster care of appellees through that agency, was adjudicated dependent, and was a child of special needs who, it is undisputed, otherwise qualified for adoption assistance subsidy,” Castille said.
“In sum, under [the DPW's] own understanding of the proper purpose of the federal and state acts, this is precisely the sort of adoption those statutes were designed to encourage and support.”
Justice Sandra Schultz Newman did not participate in the case. Justice Ralph Cappy concurred in the result only.
Richard G. Feder of the City of Philadelphia Law Department was counsel for DHS. Elkins Park attorney Sheila Oliver represented the petitioners. Myra Werrin Sacks was counsel for DPW.
