The American Legislative Exchange Council (ALEC) is a nonprofit organization that brings together state legislators and private sector representatives to draft and share practical legislation in model bills.
Senator Ben Toews of Idaho introduced our adoption legislation and did the advance work to get it on the agenda of this prestigious annual meeting. At their recent gathering of 1800 member legislators in Orlando, Terri presented our model legislation, the “Adoption. A Third Option Act” to ALEC's Health and Human Services Task Force. Senator Tammy Nichols and Representative Jordan Redman were both in the audience to offer their support. Following that presentation, our Act was embraced in two separate votes — public and private sector — with unanimous ‘aye’ votes and no ‘nayes’.
It was quite exciting!!
“Adoption. A Third Option Act” consists of six adoption-related bills that have already been passed into law in Idaho. Together those six laws will encourage women to consider adoption while also taking better care of the birth mothers who choose it. Now this Act has been approved by ALEC's HHS Task Force. (Did I mention that the votes were unanimous??) We look forward to ALEC offering its endorsement of these important laws to all other States across the country.
Hundreds of bills based on ALEC templates are introduced across state legislatures every year; studies show these models have a significantly higher-than-average chance of being enacted into law, compared to typical bills.
Since its founding in 1973, ALEC provides a valuable forum for legislators to collaborate on policies that encourage economic growth and efficiency. It facilitates relationships between lawmakers and business leaders, which can lead to most effective governance and policy-making. That is certainly the case in adoption reform, as ALEC and much of the country now looks to follow Idaho's lead in this area.
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Special thanks to Idaho Senator Ben Toews for working with ALEC to secure a Task Force hearing for “Adoption. A Third Option Act” and to Idaho Senator Tammy Nichols and Idaho Representative Jordan Redman for their ongoing support.