Section 401.540  Preferential Treatment in Child Placement

a)         Preferential treatment in child placement or any matters relating to adoption services by an agency shall not be given to its board members, contributors, volunteers, employees, agents, consultants, or independent contractors or to the relatives of these persons. Relatives, as used in this Part, are those persons related by blood or adoption, including parents, grandparents, siblings, great-grandparents, uncles, aunts, nieces, nephews, first cousins, great aunts or great uncles, and step-parents or step-siblings.  Relatives also include the spouse of these named relatives. 

b)         Agencies shall include the prohibition of preferential treatment in adoption services in the written agency policy made available to all the agency's staff. 

c)         An eligible adoption agency may be deemed compliant with this Section. This presumption of compliance may be rebutted by the Department with substantiated evidence to the contrary. The Department may require periodic certification of COA accreditation from the agency.  [225 ILCS 10/2.27 and 7.8].

(Source:  Added at 30 Ill. Reg. 2699, effective February 27, 2006)