Fees and policy as published at the time of research (statute, policy manual or fee schedule). The FBI’s standard fee rises on October 1, 2026, from $12 to $15 ($10 to $13 for volunteers), so totals may rise. The track shows how much; the map under the first question below shows who pays. Verify with each agency before formal use.
Who pays for screening
The Adam Walsh mandate rides entirely on the general Title IV-E administrative match. Every other federal screening program covers a different population.
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Part 4 of 5 · The Foster Care Compliance Gap
No dedicated federal program. Not one.
Fees from $36 to $64 in the states we checked
Walk me through it · about three minutes
Five federal mechanisms. None dedicated to the check federal law requires.
What a foster-parent check costs
From $36 to $64 in the states we checked.
$36Florida’s published foster-care fee
$64California’s published schedule (2015), before the Live Scan fee
$37.75Texas
The state pays the feeWashingtonMissouri
- the state pays
- mixed: county or placement type decides
The five states, with sources
| State | Who pays | Detail |
|---|---|---|
| Washington | State | By statute (RCW 43.43.837), DCYF pays the Washington State Patrol and FBI fingerprint fees for foster-care and child-care applicants. |
| Missouri | State | The Children’s Division pays fingerprinting costs for foster, relative and respite applicants (policy CD-26a). The July 2026 shift to applicant-paid checks applies to child-care licensing, not foster care. |
| California | Mixed; county often absorbs | CDSS fee schedule (effective December 2015): $64 for a foster family home ($32 DOJ, $17 FBI, $15 Child Abuse Central Index), plus a Live Scan site fee; counties such as San Diego pay for Resource Family Approval applicants. |
| Texas | Mixed by placement type | Applicants generally pay a $37.75 reduced-rate fingerprint fee, as DFPS publishes it (its FBI part predates the FBI’s January 2025 fee change); DFPS covers emergency parental child-safety, non-emergency kinship and ICPC placements. |
| Florida | Applicant or placing agency | FDLE’s schedule sets $24 plus a $12 FBI fee ($36) for foster-care screening, before any Live Scan vendor fee; the cost-bearer varies by placing agency. |
Who pays for screening
Five federal mechanisms. None dedicated to foster-parent screening.
- Screening programCCDBG · Family FirstChild care and institutions
- State-system grantsNational Background Check ProgramUp to $3M per state at 3:1
- Records grant, lapsedNCPA · Volunteers for Children Act$20M in total, FY1994–97
- General reimbursementTitle IV-E administrative match50%; states front the rest
- Mandate, no appropriationAdam Walsh ActFingerprint checks before placement
- Licensed child careChild-care providersCCDBG · Family First covers this population.
- Congregate careStaff of child-care institutionsCCDBG · Family First covers this population.
- Long-term careElderly and disabledNational Background Check Program covers this population.
- Criminal-history recordsState record systemsNCPA · Volunteers for Children Act covers this population.
- Family foster homesFoster and adoptive parents0dedicated programsTitle IV-E administrative match: general reimbursement, not a screening grant; Adam Walsh Act requires the check and funds nothing; 0 dedicated programs.
- Covers this population
- General reimbursement, not a screening grant
- Requires the check, no appropriation
Each mechanism as the statute or the agency describes it. The Adam Walsh check is required before every foster and adoptive placement; the only federal money behind it is the general Title IV-E administrative match. The programs and their citations are in the fold below.
The programs, with citations
| Mechanism | What it does | Why it is not a screening program |
|---|---|---|
| Title IV-E administrative match 45 CFR §1356.60(c); SSA §474(a)(3)(E) |
Reimburses states at a flat 50% for administrative costs of proper IV-E administration, including “recruitment and licensing of foster homes and institutions.” ACF’s Child Welfare Policy Manual confirms criminal-records-check costs are allowable because the check is a condition of licensure. | A general administrative reimbursement tied to licensing, not a screening grant. States front the other 50% themselves. |
| Adam Walsh Act mandate P.L. 109-248; 42 U.S.C. §671(a)(20) |
Requires fingerprint-based national and child-abuse-registry checks for prospective foster and adoptive parents before placement. | Congress created no appropriation. Compliance is enforced by funding withdrawal: place a child before checks complete and the state risks IV-E eligibility for that placement. |
| NCPA / Volunteers for Children Act P.L. 103-209 §4; 34 U.S.C. §40103(b)(2) |
Authorized $20,000,000 in total, not per year, for FY1994–1997 to computerize criminal-history records; later re-authorized for FY1999–2002. Capped volunteer fees at actual cost. | Never a foster-care subsidy, and the authorization has lapsed with no successor. |
| National Background Check Program ACA §6201 |
Grants of up to $3 million per state at a 3:1 match to build background-check systems; 29 jurisdictions (27 states, DC and Puerto Rico) took part, 2010 to 2024, and the Inspector General credits it with helping 27 develop programs. | Long-term-care settings only. Foster homes and foster-care agencies are not among its eligible categories. |
| CCDBG and Family First P.L. 113-186; P.L. 115-123 |
CCDBG funds comprehensive checks for licensed child-care providers; Family First requires checks for staff of congregate-care and child-care institutions. | Different populations. Neither funds screening of foster or adoptive parents in a family foster home. |
Sources: 45 CFR §1356.60(c)(2)(vii); ACF Child Welfare Policy Manual §8.1; P.L. 103-209 §4; 34 U.S.C. §40103(b)(2); CMS NBCP materials; HHS OIG, NBCP Final Assessment (Nov. 2024).
Every state requires checks of prospective foster and adoptive parents and of the other adults in the home, and every state requires registry checks (Child Welfare Information Gateway, 2018). The statutes are almost uniformly silent on who bears the cost, so it is left to agency policy or county budget practice. Five states’ foster-care fee policies could be verified at source; several other states publish fees for child-care licensing only, and those are left out here.
- the state pays
- mixed: county or placement type decides
- the applicant or the placing agency pays
- not yet verified at source
State agency policy as published at the time of research (statute, policy manual or fee schedule); verify with each agency before formal use.
18
the cap on volunteer check fees under the 1994 amendment, repealed in 2018
64
the highest published foster-parent fee in the states we checked (California’s 2015 schedule, before the Live Scan fee)
0
dedicated federal programs that pay for the screening the Adam Walsh Act requires
Why the funding gap compounds the compliance gap
- Cost falls on the applicantWhere the fee falls on applicants, it is one more cost of applying, at precisely the moment the system needs more willing, qualified homes.
- The incentive is perverseA state under budget pressure can under-invest in screening and feel the consequence only later, case by case, as placements become IV-E-ineligible or trigger disallowances.
- No system-building grant at allNothing on the child-welfare side resembles NBCP’s state-system grants. Every state has built, or not built, its own process independently.
- Utah, 2008: the mechanism in miniatureAllowing kinship placements before checks were completed was projected to cost the state $49,100 in FY2008 and $147,400 in FY2009 in lost federal Title IV-E funds, backfilled from the General Fund.
A platform that verifies identity once and makes that identity reusable across placements, agencies and, where states allow, state lines is designed to reduce the total screening cost every one of these funding models has to absorb, whoever currently bears it.
Sources: Child Welfare Information Gateway, background checks for prospective foster, adoptive and kinship caregivers (2018); RCW 43.43.837; Missouri Children’s Division policy CD-26a; CDSS fee schedule; San Diego HHSA CWS policy manual; Texas DFPS; FDLE fee schedule (Jan. 2025); Utah State Legislature Fiscal Note HB0036S01.
State agencies generally lacked adequate systems to readily identify whether or not they had reported missing children episodes to NCMEC accurately and in a timely manner.
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