Adoption Ark and Christian World Adoption Closed for Business!
At first, I thought I was dreaming, but the shock has started to wear off. Plus, the Associated Press has reported it now as well: Adoption Ark and Christian World Adoption have both announced they are closing their doors and filing for bankruptcy in the span of one last week.
I was first alerted to this when I saw the emails sent out to families on Facebook, both agencies have since taken down their website pages and posted the contents of the emails sent. Rather than post it in its lengthy entirety, you may read it yourself here on the Christian World Adoption site.
Adoption Ark, which I did not know originally had also closed also has a similar, though much shorter message, on its former website.
Both adoption agencies claim that they had no choice but to closed based on the difficulties in international adoptions, the reduction of “sending countries”, tighter restrictions and, the final blow, the Russian Adoption ban. Americans adopted 8,668 foreign children in the 2012 fiscal year, down 62 percent from the peak of 22,884 in 2004.
These are my favorite words to quote so far:
“Chuck Johnson, CEO of the National Council for Adoption, said he expected that many more agencies would be closing.”
I never thought I would hear me saying this, but I hope the NCFA’s Chuck Johnson is right!
Adoption “Non Profits” Showing Losses, but HUGE Income and Assets
CWA was founded in 1991 and Adoption Ark came into being in 2003. Both were listed as “Non Profits”. It is truly amazing what one can learn from looking at the IRS documents. It’s always good to follow the money; the words “non profit” tend to sound a bit false.
According to their IRS tax returns Adoption Ark, was bringing in $1,197,504.00 in income from their international adoption fees in 2008 and saw that number decrease to a mere $548,241.00 in 2011. Looking at their returns, I can see that they did indeed cut back on salaries and wages by half, but the net losses piled up. Check them out yourself: 2011, 2010, 2009
In contrast, Christian World Adoption, is very different! For one, they do not consider any of their “income” to be fees from services, but all “contributions”. If I could raise one eyebrow, I would. Also to note, their high point in 2008 shows $3,249,987.00 in net assets which dropped to $1,870,646.00 in 2011. What if find most interesting is the amounts paid to the president and secretary of the organization which stayed a pretty consistent $99,000.00 annually for all three years of their available tax returns for 2011, 2010, 2009. Now, one might be thinking that CWA president was less greedy, but alas, they both claimed to work an average of FIVE hours per week! I wish I had a job that paid almost 100K a year for five hours a week. That means that they both got paid about $380.00 per hour. Nice work if you can get it, I guess. Make sure you look at the assets lines for CWA. And they are declaring bankruptcy.
As International Adoptions Dies Down, What Does it Mean on the Domestic Front?
While this is good news in the overall arena of adoption, I do not think we can afford to let our guards down at all. We were just saying the other day how desperate the industry is getting, and I believe that we will see adoption agencies that also focus on domestic relinquishment gearing up their attacks on expectant mothers at risk just to keep their doors open and their “not” profits flowing. In order for them to stay in business, agencies will need to continue to get babies from SOMEWHERE.
Expect to see more partnering of adoption agencies with Crisis Pregnancy Centers and false “Help for Pregnant Women” in the form of Adoption Agency funnels such as Bravelove. I have heard from more than one source who has said that many former “adoption attorneys” are now finding that the majority of their work is in surrogacy law. The breeding will continue and the need for a continued voice and education is required.
The bright side, I hope, is that people who want to adopt have to turn to the foster care programs for children in need, but do not expect to see that happening as fast as we would like.
However, despite a feeling that we must continue to be vigilant I will be the eternal optimist that I am and say that these are the beginning death tolls. We are witnessing the crumbling of the Adoption Empire at its very foundation.
Burn, baby, burn!
I will not be sending flowers.
Find Adoption Events 
RIP. Such good news!
I too wondered how IA drying up would affect domestic adoption.
Yes, there will be increased pressure on expectant moms in crisis ….BUT, we need not worry about a return to anything near the haydays of adoption.
The majority of moms relinquishing today want open adoption. While some will get duped into false promises of openness, fewer adopters want to risk even duping a mother lion who want to remain in contact with her cub.
What I thus forsee is an increase in surrogacy, egg and frozen embryo sales, and likely some former adoption business owners will convert over to these methods of providing “product.” Third world women will be exploited in mass numbers over the next few decades and, the saddest part of all is that a continuing number of childrwn will come into this world anonymously with no means of finding their true genetic identity and medcial history.
What is coveted most are children who look those who pay for them like them and who have no strings atatched. Eventually…if the earth reamins here long enough, some form of cloning will be able to manufacture babies from the DNA of anyone who wants one. Which would be an improvement on the use of anonymous genetic material.
I’m not sure why you are so happy about this. Adoption Ark worked solely with foreign governments to place children who would otherwise have languished in ORPHANAGES. They did not encourage these mothers to give up their children through financial or any other means. The children available for adoption in the countries they worked with were mostly over 2 and/or special needs. Now who will take care of these kids? I’ve been to the orphanages. I’ve seen the conditions they live in. They are not places of love.
Just the simple sign of ANY adoption agencies closing brings tears of joy to my eyes. If you do not understand why, then I suggest you take some time, read around here and other sites and blogs I link to and then, perhaps, with a open heart, you will begin to understand.
If not, oh well. I can’t help you then. I’m still happy.
And have you ever heard of international corruption in ORPHANAGE based adoption situations? It’s all the rage these days. Try Google.