By the end of this year, the state Department of Human Services will have completed the adoptions of nearly 400 children in state custody. The number is triple the adoptions completed a year ago and is five times the number of annual adoptions from the mid-1990s. For its diligent efforts to place foster children in permanent homes, the state Bureau of Child and Family Services – a department under the DHS umbrella – has been selected for a national award.

Last week, Donna Shalala, U.S. Secretary of Health and Human Services, named Maine’s Bureau of Child and Family Services a recipient of the Secretary’s Special Adoption Services Award. The bureau was one of only 10 public and private agencies in the United States to receive the award.

Nominees are recommended by a national panel of adoption experts from the federal government, public and private adoption agencies and academic centers.

Maine was selected on the basis of its increased number of adoptions. Kevin W. Concannon, Maine’s DHS commissioner, called adoption “an incalculable benefit to children and families. Unquestionably it is one of the most important things we do.”

Maine has steadily increased the number of children adopted from its custody in each of the past five years. Still, more than 3,000 Maine children remain in DHS custody.

The Adoption and Safe Families Act, a federal law enacted in 1997, has paved the way for a more aggressive approach to adoption. Taking advantage of the law, the state has started a Web site listing its foster children ready for adoption. The Web site address is www.adopt.org/me.

Public and private agencies and the local media have adopted creative measures to support the adoption process.

Adoption parties, events where children available for adoption meet with prospective parents, have been organized twice in the past 14 months. A local television station airs pictures and stories of foster children available for adoption on a regular basis and the Bangor Daily News has started a bimonthly column promoting youngsters ready to be adopted called “Maine-ly Children.”

Maine’s efforts in the public and private sector to move more state children from temporary to permanent, loving families are gaining national attention, according to DHS information.

Last week, staff from Maine traveled to Oregon to outline what Maine has done to expedite the process of adoptions for children in public custody. Next week, state adoption workers will be in Washington, D.C., to present, along with Casey Family Services, an innovative post-adoption program called Maine Adoption Guides.

Referring to the Special Adoption Services Award, Concannon said he was “thrilled that Maine has been selected for such a prestigious award, particularly in the area of adoptions.”

The DHS commissioner thanked adoption caseworkers and others in the Bureau of Child and Family Services “for their extraordinarily effective efforts on behalf of children and families.”

“We are also appreciative of the concern and interest of the court systems in helping to expedite the process of adoption,” Concannon said. The ultimate effect is “to connect children to caring, capable families much earlier in their lives,” he said.