Can a Foster Family Legally Change a Child's Name Oklahoma Law

Tulsa Foster Families Savor Legal Assurances

You spend months contemplating whether to go a foster parent. You spend just equally long working to get Oklahoma foster parent certification. You prepare your domicile, and wait. Finally, the day arrives. A business-like however friendly kid protective services worker from an Oklahoma DHS kid placement agency introduces you to your foster kid. Your heart soars.

For some Tulsa families, foster parenting is very much a second career – just as much as parenting a child is to any other family. Your cascade your heart and soul into caring for a foster child. You love the child every bit i of your own, with no hope of time to come love in return.

Things seem to be going well, until 1 day, a knock on the door. It is a familiar face, with an unusually terse expression. This fourth dimension, your foster agency worker is not lone. A child welfare specialist hands you a paper.

The Dept. of Human Services worker you know leads yous away from the door, which is left standing open. The other child protective services worker marches headlong into your habitation without another word, turning toward the child's room. They are taking your foster child away, suddenly, with no notice and no caption. The child welfare workers rudely barks demands at you every bit they lead your foster child away.

Unfamiliar with your rights every bit an Oklahoma foster parent, yous might feel powerless. The state giveth and the country taketh away, yous might call back.

Oklahoma Foster Parent'south Neb of Rights

Not and so fast. That is not how it works. Non most of the fourth dimension. Oklahoma constabulary spells out a Statement of Foster Parents Rights. The statute governs how Dept. of Human Services child welfare specialists must piece of work with foster parents.

The outset statutory mandates that control DHS workers' human relationship with foster parents crave "dignity" and "respect." Granted, those terms might get lost in interpretation. Nevertheless, they brand clear what Oklahoma lawmakers wait of child welfare specialists who work with Oklahoma foster families.

Other mandates in Oklahoma's bill of foster parents rights are better phrased for legal enforcement, especially when changes are fabricated in kid placement. Oklahoma's Children's Lawmaking in nearly cases requires written notice to foster parents before a foster child may exist moved. The only exception to prior written notice is in the upshot of emergencies, or when a foster child has been in the home less than three months.

Emergencies for which prior notice may be waived include:

• a court order resulting from a hearing, including an club for placement with a parent or sibling.
• the request of the foster parent or foster home,
• for emergency medical intendance, including behavioral health caregiver,
• "substantial" noncompliance with foster-care contract requirements and agreements resulting in imminent danger to the child's health, safety or welfare,
• a awaiting investigations of alleged abuse or neglect by a foster parent or by another resident of the foster domicile.

Terms for written notification when a child is removed from a foster abode are specific. DHS or any other Oklahoma child-placing agency must provide notice v days in advance. That ways judicial days – not including weekends, holidays or days when the courts are closed. The agency must also notify the court 5 days in advance of removing a child.

Notification to foster parents or foster homes must include a written statement of the reasons the child is to be removed. If a foster parent objects to the decision, they may within five days file an objection.

Foster Parents' Right to a Hearing

When a foster parent objects to the proposed removal of a foster child, DHS kid welfare specialists may non remove the child unless and until the court authorizes the change. Upon the filing of an objection to removal of a foster child, the court must schedule a hearing within 15 days to resolve concerns of the foster parents, foster dwelling or other concerned party.

At the breezy placement hearing, foster parents or foster habitation representatives may nowadays reports and testimony virtually the relationships, experiences, behavior, needs and strengths of the kid that might be affected by a motion.

Fifty-fifty where kid welfare workers criminate an emergency reason for immediate physical removal of a child, the alleged emergency many not be used as a pretext to usurp foster parents rights to a hearing. The Oklahoma Courtroom of Civil Appeals in Veda five. DHS, 2002 OK CIV APP 65, noted a difference between immediate physical removal and permanent removal by reassignment to a new foster domicile.

An emergency decision to remove a child is different than a permanent conclusion to move a child. Reasonable suspicion that an emergency exists is enough to warrant emergency removal. Such an emergency decision past child protective services is not concluding.

Oklahoma police force allows a court to return a foster child that was removed arbitrarily or contrary to the child's treatment and service plans. Even if the court upholds an emergency removal, information technology must state — on the record — why the removal is in the best interests of the foster child.

As a foster parent, like whatsoever other parent, you take rights. Foster parents rights in Oklahoma, however, are somewhat unlike than those of an adoptive parent or biological parent. The main deviation is that Oklahoma Dept. of Homo Services has a greater role in decisions involving placement, treatment and service for Oklahoma foster children.

DHS may routinely monitor foster families to assure they meet contractual obligations and comply with agreements. That does not mean DHS can yank the rug out from under foster parents anytime a child welfare caseworker does not similar something the parents did, or but dislikes the foster parents.

Free Consultation: Tulsa Foster Parents Attorney

If you are a foster parent or operate your home every bit a group habitation for displaced children in foster care, and DHS Child Protective Services attempts to arbitrarily relocate a kid from your care, a Tulsa foster parents attorney may be able to help. For a costless consultation with a Tulsa foster parents lawyer or Tulsa group abode attorney, call Wirth Law Office at (918) 879-1681, or ship your question using the form at the superlative of this page.

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Source: https://www.wirthlawoffice.com/tulsa-attorney-blog/2016/01/oklahoma-foster-parents-rights-are-the-law

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