The New York Adoptee Rights Coalition (NYARC) has received the New York State Department of Health Adoptee Stakeholder Workgroup Report.
The report summarizes the detailed discussions from the workgroup meeting in early March. The meeting included two members of NYARC as well as attorneys, a legislator, government officials, adoptees, and a birth parent. The report illustrates broad support of an unrestricted right to one’s own original birth certificate (OBC). Public comments submitted to the DOH also demonstrate strong and diverse support for an adult adoptee’s right to obtain an OBC without discriminatory or inequitable conditions.
Opposition to an adult adoptee’s unrestricted right to obtain his or her own original birth certificate now appears so muted as to be virtually non-existent. Now is the time to get it right in New York and across the country. The DOH report demonstrates that adoptee rights matter and that little opposition exists to restore equality for all New York adoptees. We look forward to working with Governor Andrew Cuomo and New York legislators to finally make adoptees equal.
Thank you for your advocacy. I’d love to see my original sealed birth certificate that is locked away in Albany, NY.
This is great news. Prayer they will finally give Adoptees equal rights.
The Time Is Now! people have a right to know!
I would love my original birth certificate
Thankfully, the illogical arguments of opponents are becoming less and less. The very idea that a parent could gain a special “privacy right” for relinquishing custody of a child is simply absurd. After all, this country’s jails are stocked with “deadbeat dads” who, I’m quite sure, would like to claim a privacy right!
We deserve to see our original birth certificate!! Thank you!!!
Praying that we Adoptees finally are acknowledged as human beings with the right to know our history and to have available any and all documents that contain information about us.
My birth certificate is locked away 10 miles from me. I can’t begin to tell you how frustrating that is. My children,grandchildren, and I have a right to know our heritage!!
I had to give up my son in Oct 1974 I have made videos, joined many adoption Web site’s, been on the cover of a long island newspaper, had my story shared on Fios1T.V.News , Skyped & applied to Long Lost Family ,did my DNA with ancestry & registered with N.Y . state all with hopes of finding my son maybe if he was able to have a copy of his real Birth Certificate he could know about me.This needs to happen for all parties involved to help make them whole again