COMMENTARY: Reintroduces the so-called "Adoptee Bill of Rights," which contains a contact veto in Section 1, proposed Public Health Law Section 4138-E (4) (a) "A contact preference may be filed at any time by the birth parent or parents and shall prohibit the inquiring party from making contact," making this bill wholly unacceptable.  See, for example, Why Contact Vetoes Are Not An Acceptable Compromise and Conditional Access Legislation.

This bill contains a number of other flaws, but the contact "preference" is the worst of them.  It had been termed a "contact veto," but in mid-2000 was amended to rename it a "contact preference."  However, given that it still has the effect of a contact veto in that "it shall prohibit the inquiring party from making contact," this appears to have been a cynical move.  An actual "contact preference," as exists in Alabama and Oregon, is just that, a preference, and does not have legal weight

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This bill is currently before the Senate Health Committee and the Assembly Judiciary Committees.

COMMENTARY: Excessively wordy; contains propectively a disclosure veto.  Retrospectively, a waiver of confidentiality.  Infantilizes and trivializes adult adoptees by labeling them "adopted children."  Would not grant access to original birth records.  Contains parts that are now redundant due to L. 1999, C. 588.  Section nine implies that is is acceptable for adoptive parents to never tell adoptees that they are adopted.  A06972 below is identical to this bill.

This bill is currently before the Assembly Children and Families Committee.

Homepages and addresses for the Assembly sponsor, cosponsors, and multisponsors of the above bill:
 
 

Identical to A02587 above.

This bill is currently before the Assembly Children and Families Committee.

Homepages and addresses for the Assembly sponsor of the above bill:
 

SUMMARY: Requires disclosure of hereditary disease by adoptees and biological parents.

COMMENTARY: Interesting but questionable.  Information is transmitted through a confidential intermediary from adoptive parents to biological parents and vice-versa.  Information cannot be transmitted directly, nor can the adoptee notify the intermediary, nor can the intermediary notify the adoptee: the State continuing its role as parens patriae into the adoptee's adulthood.  The intermediary will charge an unspecified fee.

This bill is currently before the Assembly Children and Families Committee.

Homepages and addresses for the Assembly sponsor, cosponsors, and multisponsors of the above bill:

COMMENTARY: Even though the existing laws regarding the registry concern registrations of adoptees eighteen and over, this bill concerns adoptees twenty-one and older, which is inconsistent and without good reason.  The provisions for notification of death are so poorly written that they could render the bill largely useless.

This bill is currently before the Assembly Children and Families Committee.

Homepages and addresses for the Assembly sponsor and multisponsors of the above bill:
 

SUMMARY:  These bills would amend Domestic Relations Law, giving another option for "disclosure or access and inspection" under that law apart from establishing "good cause" and notifying the adoptive parents and others.  Adoptees of twenty-one years or older would be able to request a judge to disclose the identity of their birthparents.  The court would contact the agency that was used, the agency would check to see if they have a "letter of consent" from the birthparents, and if they do, then the agency would disclose the birthparents' identity to the adoptee.

COMMENTARY: This bill raises a number of questions.  Why twenty-one, when the New York State Adoption and Information Registry already permits adoptees of eighteen years of age to reunite with their birthparents if there is mutual consent?  Why should one pay ten dollars for the court to make a phone call to the agency?  Why couldn't one contact the agency itself?  (Why not open records!)

Homepages and addresses for the Assembly and Senate sponsors of the above bill:
 

SUMMARY:  Would prospectively grant biological parents a statutory right to consent or withhold consent to the release of an OBC to an adult adoptee, much like a disclosure veto.

COMMENTARY: This bill is completely unacceptable, and does not even appear to accomplish what it sets out to do.  It fails to amend the laws governing the Adoption Information Registry, even though it affects their functioning.  Likewise, it fails to amend the laws governing the release of OBCs.  Thus, this bill does not actually provide for the release of an OBC, even though that is ostensibly its purpose  In any case, its prospective-only nature whereby it creates two classes of adoptees: those relinquished before the bill and those after, and its creation of a disclosure veto-like right for biological parents render this bill highly objectionable.

Homepages and addresses for the Assembly and Senate sponsors of the above bill:
 

S07355  SPONSOR: Wright COSPONSORS: DeFrancisco, Hoffmann, Marchi, Maziarz, McGee, Rath, Saland, Seward, Skelos, Spano, Trunzo
A10278 SPONSOR: Stringer  COSPONSORS: Seddio, Ortiz  MULTISPONSORS: Canestrari, Clark, Galef, Glick, Gottfried, Green, Hill Hooper, Hoyt, Jacobs, Klein, Markey, Sidikman

This bill is currently before the Assembly Children and Families Committee.

SUMMARY: This bill would change the term "natural parent" to "biological parent."

COMMENTARY: The intent behind it is objectionable.  The memo for this bill states, "JUSTIFICATION: The term  'natural  parent'  tends  to stigmatize  the adoption  process  as  well  as  the adoptive parents.  Such language implies that adoptive parents are of  a  lower  status than  'natural parents.'    The  term  'biological  parent'  however, represents more positive adoption language and makes the clear distinction  between  a child`s  birth  parents  and his adoptive parents without the apparent stigmatism."  This bill is evidently catering to a few prospective adoptive parents who feel insecure about their infertility and/or the act of adoption: in short, people who are not quite ready to be adopting. Pandering to their views is inapproprate.

The term "natural parents" is not stigmatizing, nor does it imply that the adoptive parents are "of a lesser status."  Originally the two parties were called "natural parents" and "foster parents."  Fostering means nurturing; therefore the distinction is not between "natural and unnatural," but between "nature and nurture."  If the reasoning behind this bill was simply the fact that the term "natural parents" is archaic and that the term "biological parents" is now more widely used and is already employed in such statutes as Domestic Relations Law Sections 112 (2-a) and 114 (4), then this bill would be harmless.

This bill is currently before the Assembly Judiciary Committee.

Currently, it costs an adoptee $75.00 and a birthparent $20.00 to register with the State-run registry; this bill would make registration free.

S01539 passed as L. 1999, C. 504.
 

Would permit Adoption Information Registry to allow mutual consent reunions between biological siblings.

The sponsor's memo indicates that this bill would only apply to pre-adoption biological siblings (the bill itself does not so specify).

A05310 passed as L. 1999, C. 588.