Court grants adoptees
right to
track down parents
■The U.S. Supreme Court
rejects a request by six
mothers to delay the law
By Brad Cain
The Associated Press
SALEM — Perhaps Geena’s
Stonum’s birth parents aren’t even
alive. Or maybe they’d rather that
she stay away from them. But as of
Wednesday, state law is no longer
keeping this adoptee — and thou
sands more — from finding out
their true parents’ identities.
“I have a wonderful family, but
there’s still that piece that’s miss
ing,” said the 41-year-old Stonum,
a mother of two. “When you see
people who maybe look like you,
you wonder if they’re maybe relat
ed to you.”
On Tuesday, U.S. Supreme
Court Justice Sandra Day O’Con
nor rejected an emergency request
*to delay Oregon’s 1998 adoption
records law from going into effect.
That ended two years of court
battles begun by a group of birth
mothers who argued the new law
violates the privacy of people like
themselves who gave up their
children for adoption and started
new lives.
The Oregon Health Division on
Wednesday will begin processing
applications of more than 2,200
adoptees who already have paid
$15 to get their original birth cer
tificates. Most are eager to know
their parents’ identities, and many
want to know more about their
medical histories. It could take up
to six weeks to finish mailing cer
tificates to adoptees, the agency
said.
While adoptees eagerly antici
pated the chance to learn about
their past, Frank Hunsaker, attor
ney for a group of six anonymous
birth mothers who had fought the
law in court, was bitter about the
removal of the last legal roadblock.
“My clients are extremely dis
appointed and scared and even
angry that their rights have been
ignored by Oregon’s voters and
Oregon’s courts,” Hunsaker said.
He said the adoption law, which
gives adult adoptees access to
their original birth certificates, vi
olates an implied contract the
women thought they had that
their identities would be protected
and that they would never be con
tacted by the children they relin
quished.
There are some birth mothers
“who haven’t even told spouses or
{ C For years I did live in
shame, but it's a whole
different world now.
Delores Teller
adoptees’ rights
activist
n
family members” that years ago
they gave birth to children they
gave up for adoption, Hunsaker
said. “They made decisions based
on promises that they could move
on with their lives.”
But Delores Teller, an adoptees’
rights activist, argued the new law
will help birth mothers as well as
adoptees. Teller put her own baby
up for adoption when she was 16
because she didn’t want to live
with the shame of being an unwed
mother.
Teller said times have changed
— being a single parent is no
longer a stigma — and that should
be reflected in the state’s adoption
regulations.
“It (the law) affirms for us that
- what happened back then should
n’t have been so shameful and se
cret,” Teller said. “For years I did
live in shame, but it’s a whole dif
ferent world now. ”
The law first was approved by
Oregon voters in November 1998
after a campaign in which
| adoptees said that finding their
r birth parents could help detect po
tential health problems and, more
importantly, give them a sense of
identity.
Last week, a state appellate
court refused to extend an earlier
stay blocking the law from taking
effect, leaving the U.S. Supreme
Court as the only option for oppo
nents.
O’Connor, who fields emer
gency matters from Oregon for the
nation’s highest court, rejected the
six anonymous birth mothers’ re
quest to stay the law. Her action
meant it would go into effect at
5:01 p.m. Tuesday, the deadline
set earlier by the state Supreme
Court.
In 1997, the U.S. Supreme Court
refused to review a similar open
adoption records law from Ten
nessee.
Tennessee and just three other
states — Alaska, Delaware and
Kansas — allow adult adoptees ac
cess to original birth certificates,
which often have birth parents’
names. An adoption records bill in
Alabama is awaiting the gover
nor’s signature.
A spokesman for the Nation
Council for Adoption, a Washing
ton-based group that opposes
opening adoption records, pre
dicted that the number of Oregon
adoptions would decline because
birth mothers no longer have guar
antees of confidentiality.
“I think a majority of the women
will reluctantly decide to keep the
baby, to try to make it as a single
parent, and the others will termi
nate the pregnancy,” Bill Pierce
said.
Vacancies
continued from page 1
in Eugene, the market is much
tighter in terms of vacancies.
Arlene Graham, a property
manager with Portland Rental
Service, said that out of more than
200 properties that she manages,
there is only one current vacancy.
“While properties around the
campuses here have higher va
cancies than those in other parts
of Portland, we have a lot of stu
dents who live in outlying parts of
I-— ' -
the city and commute to the uni
versities,” she said.
Graham also said that her com
pany deals with a large number of
people wanting to share housing,
much like the market in Eugene.
“The quality of housing has
definitely climbed here,” she
said.
Jerry Duerksen, a broker with
Duerksen and Associates, a prop
erty management company in
Corvallis, said that vacancy rates
there are often around 2 to 3 per
cent during the year. In the sum
mer, that rate only increases to 5
or 6 percent.
“We are expecting a record en
rollment at [Oregon State Univer
sity] this year, and the existing
units are already filled up,”
Duerksen said.
fie said that several upscale
units were built in the mid-1990s,
and even those are filled to capac
ity.
“Things are definitely tighter
now than they have been in the
past,” he said.
However, rents in both Port
land and Corvallis are compara
ble to those in Eugene. Graham
said that while downtown rents
are rather high, those in southern
Portland are “more than reason
able.”
According to Duerksen, rents in
Corvallis range from $225 for a
quad apartment to $1000-plus for
a four-bedroom house.
Many property management
companies will offer discounts on
summer rents if students are plan
ning to live in Eugene in order to
finish a lease or attend summer
school.
Kent Jennings, owner of Jen
nings Property Management Co.,
said that his company offers 30 to
50 percent off on summer rents,
and some properties in Eugene
have up to 20 percent vacancy
rates during the summer months.
He attributed the renter-friend
ly market to the several new up
scale units that have been built in
the last few years.
“All of the new product being
built everywhere, along with the
new affluence among students,
will make prices more stable,” he
said. “There will be a lot more
deals and a better selection out
there.”
Treetop Refuge For Howler Monkeys
A Belizean sanctuary redefines conservation
Burning Questions
A chemical weapons incineration complex
nears completion in rural Oregon
Coyote Eradication In The West
A federal program aims to protect livestock
Twenty Years After The Eruption
Life comes back to Mount St. Helens