Text transcript of the official letter

July 28, 2026

To Our Community Partners,

The Idaho Department of Health & Welfare has been proud to partner with Eastern Washington University (EWU) and other community partners to recruit adoptive families for Idaho’s children in foster care. Since Idaho’s Wednesday’s Child began over 25 years ago, the landscape of adoption from foster care has changed yet there continues to be a need for child-specific recruitment for youth most in-need of a permanent home. Over the years the department has reorganized how permanency cases are managed to address this need and to achieve timely permanency for children who cannot return home. These changes include permanency workers “teaming” earlier with family services workers and the addition of a Family Find team to help identify previously unknown relatives and connections for our youth in care. Meanwhile, advances in technology and social media have resulted in increased risks related to public profiles causing Idaho and other states to consider the long-term impact to the youth featured.

The Idaho Department of Health & Welfare is in a position to innovate practices for child-specific recruitment while demonstrating fiscal responsibility. With this in mind, the contract for Wednesday’s Child, Waiting Families and intensive recruitment services is ending effective 09/30/2026. These services will be provided through Youth Safety & Permanency team members beginning October 1, 2026. During this transition, the current website for Idaho Wednesday’s Child will be unavailable while an updated website is created for both our waiting children and waiting families. Idaho will continue to use the AdoptUSKids website during the transition to ensure ongoing efforts to achieve permanency for waiting children.

Thank you for your continued support and advocacy on behalf of Idaho’s children.

Thank you,

Jean M. Fisher