Adoption Network Cleveland To Open

 Heart Gallery in Tower City  

Groundbreaking art show features portraits of children

 in Cuyahoga County waiting for adoption.

CLEVELAND, May 9 — Adoption Network Cleveland (ANC) has created a photographic art show in Tower City which will open to the public beginning Wednesday May 24^th.  With this professional portrait show, ANC hopes to generate awareness, reflection, discussion and hopefully action for the over 1000 children waiting for adoption in Cuyahoga county.

The Heart Gallery is located in Tower City in the former Disney Store space near the Public Square entrance. Tower City is donating the use of the space to help make the show a reality.

Twelve area professional photographers donated their time and skills in order to capture the spirit and uniqueness of the youth’s portraits in the initial phase of the show. The photos will be rotated throughout the coming year in order to showcase as many pictures as possible. Noted portrait photographer Herb Ascherman, the first photographer to step forward, also helped recruit other photographers.  It will be the first show of its kind in Northeast Ohio.

The inspiration for this unique exhibition came from Diane Granito, a social worker from Santa Fe, New Mexico who created the first Heart Gallery in 2001.  Unhappy with the rote photographs of kids waiting for adoption, Diane contacted artistic professional photographers who would be willing to try and capture the spirit and personality of each child.  This first Heart Gallery resulted in 50% of the people requesting information about the kids, following through with the licensing process. The norm is only 5%.

That kind of success caught the eyes and ears of Executive Director Betsie Norris and Development Director Emily Ford at ANC.  “Our ultimate goal in mounting this show of beautiful and touching photographs is to increase the pool of families interested in adopting these young people,” states Ms. Norris.  She adds, “It is crucial that we reduce the backlog of kids who are waiting for a permanent family to call their own.”  Photos will be replaced with new ones as children are adopted.

There is a community crisis in terms of the unacceptable number of children in the permanent custody of Cuyahoga County waiting for adoptive homes.  Partly because of changes in federal legislation, since 1997 there has been dramatic increase in the number of children entering permanent custody in Cuyahoga County.  Between 1990 and 1996 an average of 270 children a year entered permanent custody.  Between 1997 and 2002 that number had increased to an average of 697 a year.  As more children come into permanent custody, a “backlog” is created – youth who are at risk of aging out and entering adulthood without a permanent family.  The majority are teens, African-American and sibling groups who should be able to grow up together.

In 2001 United Way and the Cleveland Foundation convened civic leaders in Cuyahoga County to form a Community Vision Council charged with developing a well-coordinated solution to this critical problem.  After two years of extensive planning, reviewing barriers and examining best practices, the Vision Council selected Adoption Network Cleveland to lead Adopt Cuyahoga’s Kids (KIDS), a groundbreaking initiative designed to find adoptive homes for nearly 1,500 young people and to rate systemic change so that a backlog of waiting children will never again occur.  The original goal of the Vision Council was to place 165 youth in adoptive homes by the end of three years.  In less than two and a half years, over 275 young people have been placed!

The Heart Gallery at Tower City is free and open to the public Monday through Friday throughout the summer from 11:00 AM to 2:00 PM. A special Open House for anyone interested in adopting or mentoring a waiting child will be held on Saturday May 20th from 10:00 AM until 4:00 PM . For more information call Emily Ford at 216.325.1000.

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Adoption Network Cleveland is a unique non-profit organization that was founded in 1988 to provide adoption information, support, education and advocacy. Today ANC is a highly effective organization of 25 staff members, 175 volunteers and over 700 members. ANC serves thousands of triad members (adoptees, adoptive parents, birth parents) annually through workshops, support groups, and an adoption helpline. The organization also provides training and development on adoption-related issues for approximately 400 mental health and adoption professionals each year.