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HR 905

Illinois House•Adopted

Summary

HR 905, “KIND ACT IMPLEMENTATION”, was introduced in the House on May 14, 2026 by Rep. Marcus Evans (D) with 12 co-sponsors. It last saw action on Jun 1, 2026: Resolution Adopted.

Record

Text

HR 905 has 12 co-sponsors and 1 roll call.

hr0905/introduced.txt
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Full Text of HR0905
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	HR0905 - 104th General Assembly
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		HR0905		LRB104 21908 RMO 37797 r
HOUSE RESOLUTION
    WHEREAS, The Kinship in Demand (KIND) Act, Public Act
103-1061, was signed into law on February 5, 2025 with all
provisions going into effect on July 1, 2025; and
    WHEREAS, The KIND Act requires the Illinois Department of
Children and Family Services (DCFS) to adopt a kin-first
approach to the child welfare system, including, but not
limited to, improving access to guardianship as a permanency
goal for children in the DCFS's care, identifying and engaging
relatives throughout the duration of a case for extended
support and placement resources, and strengthening the level
and quality of support provided to relative caregivers to make
relative placements available to more children; and
    WHEREAS, The KIND Act was created and passed to ensure
better outcomes for children, maintaining and strengthening
family connections and cultural ties through relative
placement and support opportunities; pursuant to this law,
DCFS must make continual efforts to identify and engage with
family members who could serve as caregivers or sources of
support in a child's life, and the courts must provide
oversight of DCFS's obligations; and
    WHEREAS, Multiple studies have shown that sustained family
		HR0905	- 2 -	LRB104 21908 RMO 37797 r
connection provides a level of relational permanence that
cannot be replaced, presenting a myriad of benefits for
children, which include, but are not limited to, reduced
trauma, improved mental health outcomes, fewer behavioral
problems, better social outcomes and educational stability,
greater placement stability, higher levels of permanency,
stronger ties to the child's family of origin, greater
placement satisfaction for children, including feelings of
love and belonging, and enhanced connections to cultural,
ethnic, racial, and traditional communities of origin; and
    WHEREAS, Research findings from the Annie E. Casey
Foundation, among other organizations, have continually shown
that kinship care results in better outcomes for children; the
United States Congress has prioritized kinship care for
decades, enacting various laws to provide funding and national
standards to support a relative-focused foster care system
nationwide; and
    WHEREAS, The role of family members in a child's life
extends beyond placement; relatives can contribute in other
meaningful ways, such as providing assistance with visitation,
transportation, and respite care, or simply as positive role
models with whom a child interacts regularly, providing
multiple points of connection and support; and
		HR0905	- 3 -	LRB104 21908 RMO 37797 r
    WHEREAS, Initial family-finding efforts and consistent
relative engagement throughout the duration of a child's case
are crucial to securing meaningful family support and
connections, requiring DCFS to be both a partner and resource
to families throughout the process; and
    WHEREAS, Accordingly, one goal of the KIND Act is to
increase the number of children achieving permanency through
subsidized guardianship, to decrease the length of stays in
care, and to provide overall stability and sustained family
structure; guardianship has consistently proven to be the best
option for many families because it respects family
relationships when reunification is not available, and the
KIND Act has provided resources and requirements to make
kinship care and guardianship more viable options for
relatives; and
    WHEREAS, Judges are gatekeepers of parents' and children's
rights to family integrity; judges make inquiries, enter
findings, and provide essential oversight to ensure DCFS meets
its obligations to children and families under the KIND Act,
including to continuously and meaningfully engage children's
extended network of kin, thereby securing relational
permanence for children regardless of where they are placed;
and
		HR0905	- 4 -	LRB104 21908 RMO 37797 r
    WHEREAS, The KIND Act supports the ongoing reforms
required by the B.H. v. Mueller consent decree to improve the
safety of thousands of children in DCFS's care, to lessen the
length of time taken for a child to achieve permanency, and to
improve the well-being of children in care and the quality of
service provided by DCFS; and
    WHEREAS, DCFS staggered implementation of the KIND Act
with the first provisions taking effect on February 6, 2025,
which remove barriers to guardianship by providing additional
resources and supporting and prioritizing family finding,
relative engagement, and placement through enhanced caseworker
requirements, recognizing that federal law requires states to
engage and prioritize relative placements; and
    WHEREAS, The KIND Act requires DCFS to establish rules and
procedures to ensure effective implementation, including rules
to ensure fair review of decisions when relatives are denied
placement, certification, or visitation; furthermore, under
Illinois law, relative placement cannot be denied unless it is
contrary to the child's best interest, adhering to the
principles set forth in the KIND Act; and
    WHEREAS, On June 17, 2025, the Joint Committee on
Administrative Rules convened, provided approval for DCFS to
publish rules necessary for implementation, and recommended
		HR0905	- 5 -	LRB104 21908 RMO 37797 r
that DCFS plan to revise these rules approximately one year
after effectuated to respond to needs identified during the
first year of implementation; DCFS published its rules,
effective July 7, 2025; and
    WHEREAS, On August 4, 2025, Illinois State Representative
and President of the National Conference of State Legislatures
(NCSL) Marcus C. Evans Jr. presented at the annual NCSL
Legislative Summit as part of a panel to discuss how
legislators across the nation can bolster relative engagement
and improve outcomes for children involved with the foster
care system by embracing a kin-first approach as described in
the KIND Act; and
    WHEREAS, On December 4, 2025, DCFS celebrated its official
launch of relative caregiver certification in Illinois with a
virtual town hall attended by nearly 5,000 child welfare
professionals; this launch included training, which detailed
the processes for caseworkers and DCFS staff; DCFS also
released Procedures 415 to guide case workers through the
certification process, among other administrative
requirements; and
    WHEREAS, By the close of 2025, nearly one year after the
guardianship provisions of the KIND Act went into effect,
Illinois achieved its highest rate ever of permanency for
		HR0905	- 6 -	LRB104 21908 RMO 37797 r
children in care two or more years, due to record numbers of
adoptions and guardianships that DCFS finalized in 2025; this
rate is only expected to rise with the continual rollout and
implementation of the KIND Act; and
    WHEREAS, In March of this year, Illinois was recognized as
the nation's leader in the placement of children with
relatives by the United States Department of Health and Human
Services, in part due to DCFS's dedicated commitment to
implementing the KIND Act and its kin-first approach; Illinois
is one of 19 states and six tribes for which the Children's
Bureau has approved plans to differentiate licensing standards
for kinship providers; and
    WHEREAS, After regional testing, DCFS activated relative
caregiver certification statewide on March 9, 2026, providing
increased financial support to certified relative caregivers
on par with the board payments provided to foster parents and
bringing new federal funding to the State to subsidize this
increase; and
    WHEREAS, In May 2026, the American Civil Liberties Union
of Illinois released a suite of resources regarding the KIND
Act, providing information for parents, relatives, and court
stakeholders to learn about and advocate for the rights
provided under the KIND Act; and
		HR0905	- 7 -	LRB104 21908 RMO 37797 r
    WHEREAS, In honor of National Foster Care Month being
observed in May and International Day of the Family being
observed on May 15, it is fitting to recognize the progress,
improvements, and implementation efforts made by DCFS in
furtherance of a stronger child welfare system and a
commitment to relative engagement, placement, and care; and
    WHEREAS, Throughout 2026, the number of children in care
has continued to decrease, with the current caseload number at
the lowest it has been in the last five years, indicating that
as DCFS continues to improve its efforts to ensure relative
supports and relational permanence, the overall outcomes for
children can only grow stronger; while, as always, there is
more progress to be made, the momentum and tangible changes
that the KIND Act has set into motion are commendable
achievements, explaining why other jurisdictions are
consulting with Illinois as they consider bringing reforms
similar to the KIND Act to their own jurisdictions; and
    WHEREAS, As recently reported by the U.S. Department of
Health and Human Services' Assistant Secretary for Planning
and Evaluation, Illinois was recognized as having the highest
percentages of children living with relatives or kin while
entering care and in foster care, 76% and 57% respectively,
compared to all other states; comprehensive child welfare
		HR0905	- 8 -	LRB104 21908 RMO 37797 r
policymaking, with an emphasis on kinship care policy, must
remain at the forefront as a state-level priority and continue
to be supported through all available legislative, executive,
and judicial tools, including continual discussion and reform
efforts within the General Assembly, as the legislature plays
an important role in the systemic change of DCFS; therefore,
be it
    RESOLVED, BY THE HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES OF THE ONE
HUNDRED FOURTH GENERAL ASSEMBLY OF THE STATE OF ILLINOIS, that
we acknowledge the accomplishments and implementation progress
of the Kinship in Demand (KIND) Act, recognizing the time and
resources devoted by the Illinois Department of Children and
Family Services (DCFS) and the leadership of the Governor's
Office, and we urge DCFS to aggressively continue
implementation of the KIND Act to deliver permanency to more
children and to keep families together even when reunification
is not possible, ensuring children have loving, stable homes;
and be it further
    RESOLVED, That we urge DCFS to execute needed revisions to
Rule 415 one year after all statutory provisions went into
effect, as discussed at the Joint Committee on Administrative
Rules hearing in June 2025, incorporating revisions based on
identified issues and lessons learned from DCFS's
implementation efforts to ensure that the KIND Act can be
		HR0905	- 9 -	LRB104 21908 RMO 37797 r
properly and uniformly enforced across the State and that the
spirit of all statutory requirements is fully realized, such
as the harmonization of statute and rule related to the
placement decision review processes; and be it further
    RESOLVED, That we urge DCFS to actively pursue the
recently announced federal funding opportunities by the U.S.
Department of Health and Human Services Administration for
Children & Families to support kinship navigator services and
to bolster the implementation of the KIND Act, providing
greater supports for kin involved with DCFS throughout the
State of Illinois; and be it further
    RESOLVED, That we urge DCFS to provide continual, updated
training opportunities and resource materials for staff,
tailored to meet the changing needs of caseworkers, families,
and overall departmental cohesion and effectiveness, with a
focus on building relational permanence for children; and be
it further
    RESOLVED, That we urge the Administrative Office of the
Illinois Courts to provide effective statewide judicial
education on the KIND Act and support the judiciary's efforts
to diligently implement the components of the KIND Act,
including the necessary oversight to enforce the KIND Act's
provisions requiring DCFS to meaningfully engage in initial
		HR0905	- 10 -	LRB104 21908 RMO 37797 r
and ongoing family finding and relative engagement efforts,
consistently place children with kin unless it is contrary to
children's best interests, and meaningfully consider
guardianship as a permanency option when reunification is not
possible; and be it further
    RESOLVED, That suitable copies of this resolution be
delivered to the Chief Justice of the Supreme Court of
Illinois, the Administrative Director of the Illinois Courts,
and the Director of the Department of Children and Family
Services.

Acknowledges the accomplishments and implementation progress of the Kinship in Demand (KIND) Act. Urges the Illinois Department of Children and Family Services (DCFS) to aggressively continue implementation of the KIND Act to deliver permanency to more children and to keep families together even when reunification is not possible. Urges DCFS to execute needed revisions to Rule 415 one year after all statutory provisions went into effect. Urges DCFS to actively pursue the recently announced federal funding opportunities by the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services Administration for Children & Families to support kinship navigator services and to bolster the implementation of the KIND Act. Urges DCFS to provide continual, updated training opportunities and resource materials for staff. Urges the Administrative Office of the Illinois Courts to provide effective statewide judicial education on the KIND Act. Supports the judiciary's efforts to diligently implement the components of the KIND Act.

Sponsors

Rep. Marcus Evans (D) sponsors HR 905, and 12 members have co-sponsored it.

Committees

HR 905 went before 2 committees: Rules and Adoption & Child Welfare.

Rules
Rules
Referred to · May 15, 2026 · 5,290 Bills
Adoption & Child Welfare
Adoption & Child Welfare
Referred to · May 19, 2026

History

HR 905 has taken 18 actions since May 14, 2026, the latest on Jun 1, 2026.

ChamberAction
Jun 1, 2026
House
Resolution Adopted
May 26, 2026
House
Recommends Be Adopted Adoption & Child Welfare Committee; 012-000-000
May 26, 2026
House
Placed on Calendar Order of Resolutions
May 26, 2026
House
Added Co-Sponsor Rep. Lisa Davis
May 26, 2026
House
Added Co-Sponsor Rep. Kevin John Olickal

Votes

HR 905 went to 1 roll call in the House, the latest on May 26, 2026 at 12–0.

ChamberQuestion
Yea
Nay
May 26, 2026
House
House Adoption & Child Welfare Committee
12
0

Source: ilga.gov · legiscan.com