By Rob Moritz
Arkansas News Bureau

LITTLE ROCK — Gov. Mike Beebe said today he still opposes an initiated act voters approved last year banning unmarried couples from adopting or fostering children, and he thinks the law has hindered the state’s ability to recruit qualified parents.

Selection of adoptive and foster parents “should be handled on a case-by-case basis based on what is the best interest of the child,” Beebe told reporters after signing a proclamation declaring November Adoption Awareness Month in the state.

The governor said he did not know if any studies had been done to determine if Initiated Act 1 had caused a reduction in qualified foster or adoptive parents, but “anecdotally, I would believe that that potentially is there.”

Cecile Blucker, director of the Department of Human Services’ Division of Children and Family Services, said she was not aware of any studies or anecdotal evidence.

Blucker said there were 601 adoptions of Arkansas children between Oct. 1, 2008, and Sept. 30, nearly 100 more than the year before and 200 more than in 2007.

She credited the increase to an aggressive public awareness campaign.

Jerry Cox, executive director of the conservative group Family Council, which spearheaded Initiated Act 1 last year primarily to prevent gay couples from adopting or fostering children, said he doubts the act has hurt the recruiting of foster parents and adoptive parents.

“Act 1 didn’t repeal anything,” Cox said. “It didn’t change the number of available homes over what was already available. DHS already had a policy that we don’t place foster children in homes with live-in boyfriends and girlfriends.”

As for adoptions, DHS did not have such a policy and Act 1 made it law, he said.

Voters approved the measure with 56 percent of the vote.

During the proclamation ceremony Wednesday at the state Capitol, DHS unveiled a new Web site it hopes to have online by Nov. 21 featuring photographs and biographies of every child available for adoption. Blucker said 500 children in Arkansas are waiting to be adopted.

“Finding a safe and nurturing environment is always a top priority when children can’t be reunited with their biological families, but when that is no longer an option, we also utilize a data-matching system to try to identify the best for the children,” she said.

During the news conference, Elizabeth Robison, 16, of Monticello, spoke about how she and her younger sister, Amy, lived at Arkansas Children’s Baptist Home for five years until recently being adopted by Bobby and Theresa Robison.

Also addressing a crowd of about 50 people were 9-year-old Cheyenne Cox and 13-year-old Ina Cox, who along with two siblings were adopted two years ago by Boo and Beth Cox in Dewitt.

“Adoption is a blessing,” Beth Cox said. “It completed our family. We have grown together … it may be a completion for the children, but it’s also completion for the family that was unable to have children.”