Act No. 106

Public Acts of 2015

Approved by the Governor

June 30, 2015

Filed with the Secretary of State

June 30, 2015

EFFECTIVE DATE: September 28, 2015

STATE OF MICHIGAN

98TH LEGISLATURE

REGULAR SESSION OF 2015

Introduced by Reps. Runestad, Lauwers, Tedder, Crawford, Victory, Johnson, Price, McCready, Hooker, Hughes, Howrylak, Farrington, Gamrat, Kelly, Canfield, Wittenberg, Hovey-Wright, Dianda, Irwin, Robinson, Plawecki, Byrd, Banks, Gay-Dagnogo, Greig, Schor, Yanez, Chirkun, Singh, Durhal, Moss, Santana, Heise, Rendon, McBroom, Chang, Glardon, Bumstead, Leutheuser, Kosowski, Vaupel, Bizon, Derek Miller, Chatfield and Garcia

ENROLLED HOUSE BILL No. 4457

AN ACT to amend 1994 PA 203, entitled “An act to establish certain standards for foster care and adoption services for children and their families; and to prescribe powers and duties of certain state agencies and departments and adoption facilitators,” by amending section 8 (MCL 722.958), as amended by 2002 PA 646.

The People of the State of Michigan enact:

Sec. 8. (1) The department shall promulgate rules under the administrative procedures act of 1969, 1969 PA 306, MCL 24.201 to 24.328, to ensure the comprehensive, high-quality training of foster care and adoption workers. The department shall consult and may contract with colleges and universities, child placing agencies, and professional organizations for the design and implementation of the training. The training shall stress cultural sensitivity, interagency cooperation, and respect for individuals and families.

(2) The department shall maintain a directory of children under the jurisdiction of the department who are available for adoption. The department shall ensure that interested individuals have reasonable access to the directory.

(3) The department shall maintain a registry of adoptive homes to be used as a central clearinghouse for information about prospective adoptive parents. The department shall accept information from a prospective adoptive parent who has received a preplacement assessment with a finding that the individual is suitable to be the parent of an adoptee. The information shall be filed in a form and manner that will permit it to be readily accessible to biological parents or child placing agencies seeking adoptive homes for children. The department shall provide information in the registry without charge to biological parents or child placing agencies who request it.

(4) The department may establish as pilot projects foster parent resource centers. Each resource center shall provide at least support for and coordination of respite care and assistance to foster parents in obtaining day care. Resource center staff shall pursue other activities designed to promote permanency for children, particularly children with special needs, such as support aimed at retaining foster parents. The department may fund the pilot foster parent resource centers using money appropriated to the department for the current fiscal year. After the pilot project has been in operation for 2 years, the department shall evaluate the pilot project on its organization, effectiveness, and success. The department shall report the results of this evaluation to the legislature, including in the report the number of foster parents who utilized the particular resource center and the top 10 concerns raised by those foster parents and how those concerns were handled.

Enacting section 1. This amendatory act takes effect 90 days after the date it is enacted into law.

This act is ordered to take immediate effect.

Clerk of the House of Representatives

Secretary of the Senate

Approved

Governor