As North Carolina’s foster care laws undergo reform with the passage of HB612, signed by Gov. Josh Stein over the summer, the case of Scott and Ginger Rhoads highlights the challenges some families say they face within the system. The licensed foster parents say that in April 2022 they were denied the opportunity to legally adopt their foster child because of the color of their skin, and they have been battling Guilford County Department of Social Services in North Carolina courts ever since.
The Rhoadses took “T” in when he was an infant. For two years, the Guilford County Department of Social Services (DSS) attempted to reunite him with his biological mother, who had a history of maltreatment.
“After 28 months of trying to reunify T with his biological mother, DSS declared him abandoned,” Ginger Rhoads told Carolina Journal in an interview. “This was far past the North Carolina statute of limitations for abandonment of a child.”…