If you are involved in a Termination of Parental Rights (TPR) case, you must protect your rights immediately. Termination of Parental Rights is a permanent cessation of the legal relationship between a parent and child. It is a “last resort’ designed to promote the “best interests of the child.” TPR occurs after a child has been in foster care for 12 out of 22 months and is required by Alabama law unless three exceptions occur. Therefore, parents only have a limited amount of time to show improvement in their circumstances. The time to protect yourself from TPR is before it ever begins.
If your child is in DHR custody, you must immediately begin to protect your rights.
1. Get an Attorney
For starters, if you can afford attorney, GET ONE. If you cannot afford an attorney, file an Affidavit of Hardship with the juvenile court so that you may be granted an attorney by a judge if you qualify financially. An attorney can keep you apprised of the law, ensure DHR compliance, and represent you in court before the judge in the required hearings in juvenile court.
2. Comply with DHR’s Individual Service Plans
DHR caseworkers and supervisors will create an individualized service plan for parents to follow for reunification with their children. Those plans will include services that DHR is to provide to the parents to aid in reuniting the parents and children. It is imperative for parents to follow those plans and show improvement in their circumstances in order to regain custody of their children. The longer that a child sits in DHR custody and in a foster home, the more danger a parent faces in lessening of the parent/child bond and of the countdown clock to TPR reaching zero.
3. Secure Relative Resources
Parents can slow or even cease the TPR clock by helping DHR locate appropriate relatives that may take over custody of the children while the parents get their lives together. These “relative resources” can prevent DHR from having to terminate the rights of the parents. These relatives require clean backgrounds free from child abuse and neglect (ca/n) indications and their home and occupants must undergo inspection by DHR caseworkers.
4. Visit Your Children Regularly and Continue to Provide For Them
Part of what makes case for TPR is whether a parent has “abandoned a child” or “failed to provide for their material needs.” Children need the continued physical and emotional support from their parents even when apart. Children also need financial care from their parents even if the child is being cared for by DHR. Don’t assume because the State is caring for the children that it gives you the right not to pay support. Not doing so helps build a case that you are not financially providing your children. Paying support or buying clothing, shoes, toiletries and gifts go a long way in proving that you remain involved in the lives of your children.
TPR is not required if (1) children are placed with a relative and that relative has agreed, formally or informally to provide a permanent home for the child; (2) services have not been provided by child welfare staff necessary for the child’s safe return; or (3) a “compelling reason” exists that filing or joining a TPR is not in the best interest of the child.
Termination of Parental Rights is final. Parents lose all rights and responsibilities to their children, to physical custody, to visitation, to decide their upbringing and education. After the parent’s rights are terminated, the children are then eligible for adoption. The children are then issued a new birth certificate with their new parents as mother and father.
In order to protect yourself from this life-altering occurrence, contact Sheena Gamble, Attorney At Law today.