Editorial: Adoption bill a terrible idea

Kansas families with the desire and wherewithal to provide a healthy, loving environment for children should be eligible to adopt. It should go without saying that the family’s religion, sexual orientation and race should make no difference.

For that reason, the so-called Adoption Protection Act should never become law in Kansas.

Under the act, child placement agencies that receive state contracts for placing children with adoptive and foster parents would not be required to consider placing children in any home that violates the agencies’ “sincerely held religious beliefs.” Bills outlining the act — House Bill 2687 and Senate Bill 401 — have been proposed in both chambers of the Kansas Legislature.

Child welfare advocates and a leading gay rights organization spoke out this week against the proposed bills. “Taxpayer dollars should not be used to discriminate against other taxpayers,” said Thomas Witt told lawmakers considering the bill during a committee meeting.

Witt is the executive director of Equality Kansas, a gay rights advocacy group.

In Kansas, all child placements in the state are managed by private nonprofit agencies working on contract with the state. Supporters of the bill said the legislation would protect faith-based organizations from losing their state contract or facing lawsuits because they refuse to place children in homes other than those that include married, heterosexual couples.

Others rightly worried that the bill would reduce the number of placements at a time when Kansas has more children in foster care than ever before.

“I am concerned that if this bill becomes law there will be a chilling effect, and those individuals and couples who may be inclined to consider adoption will not do so,” Wyandotte County District Court Judge Kathleen Lynch said in written testimony. “The chilling effect will result in more children coming into the foster care system. The message that needs to be sent is that Kansas is open to all individuals and couples who wish to provide a loving home to children.”

The Adoption Protection Act bills should never make it out of committee. Hopefully, lawmakers recognize the chilling message it would send if they approve a bill giving organizations permission to openly discriminate against families in the adoption process. Besides, any organization that would deny a couple the opportunity to be parents because of the couple’s sexual orientation or religious beliefs shouldn’t be in the child placement business anyway.