The Engineer in me said “Let's get it on” I was on a roll to get the adoption finalized. Jumping onto the net for Los Angeles County courts and came up with a forum posting from 2007
http://forums.adoption.com/russia-adoption/304400-re-adoption-california.html
Readoption in CA is done via the Family/ Juvenile Court. I would recommend a trip to your local county court, within the Juvenile dept. They have a packet that they hand out that has all of the forms, etc that need to be completed. In general, it worked this way for us:
1. Complete and hand-file all forms with the court
2. Court assigns a case number
3. Provide case number to your homestudy agency
4. HS agency completes report (may require visit to your home) and submits that to the court along with a Consent and Joinder
5. When you know that has been submitted, call the court to ask for a court date
6. Court date is easy - appear before a judge, sign stuff, get a picture, and you're done
7. Within about 6 months, you'll receive the CA birth cert
CA does not do foreign recognition like some other states do. We have readoption processes available and in-place, so that is what you need to do.
Here is the link to all of the CA adoption forms:
http://www.courtinfo.ca.gov/cgi-bin/forms.cgi
(you may need to pull down "adoption" on the menu)
Here is the package that is handed out at the courthouse:
http://www.courtinfo.ca.gov/forms/documents/adopt050.pdf
There are 12 documents plus the one above that can be downloaded. You have 2 choices one is a straight pdf that you print out and pen & ink it. The other is a fillable pdf. Depending on the reader you use you may or may not be able to save the fillable form. I sometimes find that .if you use Adobe Reader you sometimes, depending on the form, may not be ale to save your work. I have a full version of Adobe 5.0 and sometimes that works. For the files that are stubborn I have been using Foxit Reader Of the forms on the site I will need to fill out form 020, 200, 210, 215 and 230. It will take about all of 1 to 2 hours to do them and that is just what I did. Then I called the adoption agency and said hey get my that home study... Screeeeetch. Sorry, you can't have the first Post Placement Home Study until Camillle has been home for 3 months (India requires quarterly updates). Well that is a bummer.
A friend of ours has worked her whole life with lawyers and pointed us to
http://www.lasuperiorcourt.org/courtrules/chapter13.htm#13.5c
Don't go there! it is a black hole reserved for lawyers and if you are going to adopt without lawyers then you will not need this web site.
In fact the county of LA has really made it easy. After searching the Superior Court web site I decided I better figure out which one those web sites were really right. First of all we have a courthouse right next to LAX and it is quite convenient. The other one is off the 710 and the 10 freeways aka Monterey Park. Not sure about other cities as the county has numerous courthouses for adoption. Note that not all LA county courts do adoptions. Since I was still on leave I took a quick jaunt up to the court to get an info packet. Parking is $4 a hit. Yikes didn't like that. I had Aiden d and she wanted to walk so we did. It was a nice day for a walk with my 1 ½ year old. This courthouse is specialized, they only deal in Juvenile cases. It is called the Edmund D. Edelman Children's Court. Not like any courthouse I have ever seen. Children are actually welcomed and it is nowhere near as stuffy as the LAX courthouse. So Nah! when the time comes we will file there. And yes they gave me a packet of material to fill out and except for one form it is exactly what was on the first web site. Found out the LAX courthouse does not do adoptions.
Some extra info that was not on the web site:
Prepare original -200 and make 4 copies
Attach complete set of copies of foreign country adoption docs along with notarized translation (not a problem here as the India courts use Kings English)
Attach cert for grounds for assignment to district to the adoption request Form-020 (not on the web site of forms but you can get it here www.lasuperiorcourt.org/forms/pdf/FAM020.pdf )
Memorandum for Setting for Hearing – original and 1 copy (not available anywhere from what I can see)
Original and 2 copies of form 210
Original and 3 copies of form 215
Original and 1 copy of form 230
Filing cost - $20
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