Daughter of lesbian moms shares her story of frustration over adoption hearing in Miami

Jessica Cohn-Kleinberg (pictured) is a senior at a Miami high school. She’s spent the past three years working for Safe Schools South Florida and other groups – speaking to counselors, teachers and students about life with gay parents.

Jessica attended a meeting of the Senate Committee on Children, Families and Elder Affairs, which held a public hearing in Miami to discuss foster care and adoption issues. She shares her experience in a piece for Express Gay News.

She explains the meeting’s disappointing agenda:

“Sen. Ronda Storms created a system that lined up adoptive parents, foster parents and agencies to speak first, which seemed logical until one realized that this system left out most of our supporters: the gay parents who want to adopt as well as agencies such as SAVE Dade, Safe Schools South Florida and others.”

And continues:

“I had my story all ready, annotated and everything. But I never got a chance to tell it. I never got a chance to tell those people with the stoic faces, just how amazing my gay moms are; that I am a good person — not despite the fact that my parents are gay but because my parents are gay. I wasn’t able to speak along with about 20 other people.”

Jessica reports that approximately 300 people attended the meeting, and some education took place:

“I witnessed former Rep. Elaine Bloom, along with her son, his partner and two children beg for change. I heard a gay man who worked in the foster care system say how ridiculous it was that he could decide the fate of children in the system but couldn’t adopt a child himself. I saw a young woman talk about how her gay foster moms saved her life.”

Jessica Cohn-Kleinberg is in the Drama Magnet Program at Dr. Michael M. Krop Senior High School in Miami. She loves to write and hopes to make a career out of it one day. But most of all she wants to be an instrument of change in our society.

Image Source: Express Gay News
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