This article was copy without editing from Department of Social Services Websites at this link.
On Wednesday June 2nd, 2010, a record was broken for the number of children adopted in South Carolina in a single day. Sumter County Family Court Judge, The Honorable George M. McFaddin, Jr. will hosted another Adoption Day in Sumter Family Court where he gave the SC Department of Social Services an entire court day to finalize adoptions.
A total of 39 adoptions were finalized. From 9:00 a.m. until 7:00 p.m. Judge McFaddin will finalize adoptions all day with no lunch break. This is at least the fourth such Adoption Day Judge McFaddin has hosted for South Carolina’s waiting children. In November, Judge McFaddin finalized 26 adoptions. Each time he has held Adoption Day in his courtroom, the number of adoptions granted has grown.
Of note, Judge McFaddin does have some assistance with the hearings beyond what one might expect. His assistant is a long haired dachshund named Moose who gently puts the children at ease in what would normally be a daunting courtroom setting. Most of the children are as delighted to pet Moose, before or after their adoption, as Moose is to be coddled by them.
Judge McFaddin works to help children find permanency by calling attention to the many children who await families. While DSS has had 2 record breaking years of adoption finalizations (523 adoptions finalized last fiscal year and 513 adoptions the prior year), many more children continue to await families. Currently, there are approximately 5100 children in foster care in South Carolina and approximately 1713 have the plan of adoption.