To Whom It May Concern:

I recently read that the Virginia State Board of Social Services is considering whether to approve regulations prohibiting adoption agencies from discriminating against prospective adoptive parents based on gender, age, religion, political beliefs, sexual orientation, disability, or family status. 

I would like to encourage the board to pass these regulations. There are many children being bounced around the foster system while suitable parents are being turned away on the basis of such things as sexual orientation. The state needs to act in the best interest of the child. Private organizations, acting on behalf of the state, must follow these same principles.

Some of my family members have been in the foster system. Unless you have personally been in a foster home, it's incredibly difficult to describe the sense of pain and fear a child experiences even in the best foster homes. Children need love, stability, and structure. While a foster home can provide love, it cannot provide long-term stability and structure.

There are plenty of suitable parents out there ready to adopt children and take them out of the foster system. Please don't turn away a family ready to provide love, stability, and structure to a child based solely on things such as those mentioned above.

Thank you for taking the time to read this letter.

Respectfully,

Gordon F. Martin

1317 Queen Street

Alexandria, VA 22314