Community leaders ring bell; help children's adoption wishes come true this holiday season

November 27, 2019

St. Lucie West -

What do children in foster care really want for Christmas? They want a family to spend it with.

Communities Connected for Kids and the Judicial Circuit 19 Guardian ad Litem program are counting down to Christmas this December with #TCRings, a program to raise awareness for our community's needs for foster and adoptive homes.

Each day on Facebook, we will visit a different community or business leader. That person will will read a child's adoption wish and ask a very important question: Can you help us make a child's wish for a family come true this holiday season?

"These are interesting people with a lot of followers on social media, so we hope they can help us increase awareness," said Christina Kaiser, CCKids community relations director.

Those enlisted in the project include St. Lucie County Fire Chief Nate Spera, Florida Senator Gayle Harrell and business and media partners like the Hometown News, the St. Lucie Mets and Texas Roadhouse.

There's even a circus family who comes down from the trapeze to ring the bell, Kaiser said.

Fewer than 20 percent of local children available for adoption are without family matches - a record low for the Treasure Coast and Okeechobee.

In fact, 114 out of 142 total children available for adoption are matched to families and beginning the adoption process, said Kaiser, crediting the record percent of matches to the recruitment efforts of CCKids' adoption-service provider Children's Home Society.

"They have really worked hard to find matches for children who historically are more difficult to match," Kaiser said. "They're finding more homes for large sibling groups, older teens and children with disabilities."

Other reasons include increased awareness generated by media partners like News Channel 12 and the Forever Family program, and new match-making technology provided by companies like the Selfless Love Foundation.

Social media campaigns like #TCRings also help.

"We hope this project will help identify families for those 28 children who currently don't have a match," Kaiser said.

Pictured above are Will Havik and Isaac Ankenman of the Momentum Foundation, an organization that teaches aerial acrobatics in Port St. Lucie. Foundation vice president Angel Havik and her son were among the many local residents featured in the #TCRings project, which will begin airing December 1.