FINAL_22_21_DPSS_AnnualReport

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RIVERSIDE COUNTY DEPARTMENT OF PUBLIC SOCIAL SERVICES

Children’s Services employees from the Adoption Finalization Day committee pose for a photo outside the downtown Riverside historic courthouse. Annual Adoption Finalization Day: Finding Forever Homes

I n November 2021, Riverside County had another successful Adoption Finalization Day. This annual event celebrates families who have grown through adoption. This admirable journey offers a path to healing and hope for children in foster care who cannot safely reunify with their birth parents. “We’ve had our son since birth, and now he is 15 months old,” said Katie Bayer, standing outside the Indio courthouse, holding the little one who was about to become her third adopted child. “We wanted to be a forever home from the

beginning, so when we received a child, they could stay as long as they needed to.”

Inside the courtroom, the Bayer family signed documents and listened to the judge declare their one-year-old son Levi, as their child. A round of applause and cheers greeted the joyful moment. This ceremony was only one of dozens at the Larson Justice Center in Indio and the Riverside Historic Courthouse, where nearly 60 children were officially adopted by their families.

Annual Report 2021/2022