Custom Adoption and Foster to Adopt in the NWT

Many people who start as foster parents end up asking the permanency question — what happens if a child cannot go home? In the Northwest Territories, that question does not have a single answer. There are multiple pathways from foster care to permanent placement, and the one that applies depends on the child's Indigenous community, their legal status, and the wishes of the biological family and Indigenous governing body. Understanding your options before you need them is considerably better than discovering them in the middle of an emotional situation.

Why Permanency Planning in the NWT Is Different

The NWT's child welfare population is approximately 99% Indigenous. That single fact shapes every aspect of permanency planning. Standard provincial adoption processes — through a court, with a judge granting an adoption order, severing legal ties with the biological family — are often not the preferred or culturally appropriate pathway for Indigenous children.

In many Indigenous communities in the NWT, the concept of a child being "adopted" away from their family and community in a permanent, legally irrevocable sense runs counter to traditional values about kinship and the fluidity of family responsibility. The NWT's legal framework has evolved to reflect this. Custom adoption, recognized under territorial legislation, provides a pathway to permanency that respects Indigenous custom and maintains the community connections that are central to a child's identity.

What Custom Adoption Is

Custom adoption is a traditional Indigenous practice in which a child is raised by a family member or community member other than their biological parents, according to the customs and laws of the community. This practice has existed in Dene, Inuvialuit, Tłı̨chǫ, and other NWT Indigenous communities since long before any territorial or federal legislation existed.

Custom adoption arrangements are often "open" in nature — the child knows their biological parents, maintains relationships with biological family members, and understands that they belong to an extended community. The adoptive parents are not strangers who received a stranger's child through a bureaucratic process; they are people who were already part of the child's world.

The Aboriginal Custom Adoption Recognition Act

The Aboriginal Custom Adoption Recognition Act (ACARA) is the piece of NWT legislation that gives custom adoptions formal legal recognition. Under ACARA, a custom adoption can be legally documented and recognized without going through the standard court adoption process.

How ACARA works: A person designated under the Act — typically a representative of the relevant Indigenous governing body or a recognized customary law authority — certifies that the adoption was carried out according to the customs of the community. That certification is filed with the territorial registrar and creates a legally recognized adoption. The child can then obtain documents — including a birth registration and NWT identification — reflecting their adoptive family.

What ACARA provides that court adoption does not: A standard court adoption severs the legal relationship between the child and their biological parents. It is a formal, adversarial proceeding that can be traumatic for all parties. ACARA recognition is a community-affirmed process that gives the adoption legal standing without the adversarial framing — and often without severing the relationships that the community considers important to maintain.

Which communities can use ACARA: The Act applies where the adoption is carried out according to the customs of an Indigenous people recognized under the Act. The relevant Indigenous governing body in the child's community is the authority on whether ACARA applies and who has the standing to certify the adoption. The FFCNWT and your regional social worker can direct you to the appropriate contact within the relevant governing body.

Foster to Adopt in the NWT

Unlike some provinces that have formal "legal risk placement" programs where children are placed with foster parents specifically because they may be available for adoption, the NWT does not use that terminology formally. However, the reality of long-term foster care in the NWT is that children who cannot be reunified with their biological families and for whom no kinship placement is available will often remain with their foster family indefinitely.

For foster parents, "foster to adopt" in the NWT most often looks like this: a child is placed with you in long-term care, reunification with the biological family becomes formally closed as a goal, and the question of permanency is then raised. At that point, two primary pathways exist:

Custom adoption through ACARA. If the child is Indigenous — which, again, is the case in approximately 99% of NWT placements — and the biological family and Indigenous governing body are open to it, a custom adoption through ACARA is the preferred pathway. This keeps the adoption within the cultural framework of the community, maintains open relationships where appropriate, and gives the child legal permanency without the court's adversarial process.

Departmental adoption. Standard adoption through the territorial court process is available for children who are Crown wards — children for whom a court has already terminated parental rights. This process is managed through HSS and involves a formal matching process, a home study (which is separate from the foster care home study), and a court hearing. For children from Indigenous communities, the adoption home study will specifically address the adoptive family's plan for maintaining the child's cultural connections post-adoption.

Subsidized Adoption in the NWT

When a child from foster care is adopted, the adoptive family may be eligible for subsidized adoption support — ongoing financial assistance that recognizes the higher needs of children who have been in the child welfare system and the additional costs associated with those needs.

Subsidized adoption in the NWT is provided on a case-by-case basis, assessed against the child's specific needs and the family's circumstances. Children who have specialized needs — medical, developmental, behavioural — are the primary candidates for adoption subsidy. The subsidy is not automatic; it requires an assessment and a formal agreement negotiated with HSS before the adoption is finalized.

The subsidy rates in the NWT are calibrated to the child's needs level rather than the community per-diem structure, unlike foster care payments. Your social worker and the regional adoption coordinator can provide specifics about current subsidy amounts for children at different needs levels.

Navigating the Permanency Decision

Permanency decisions are among the most emotionally complex moments in foster care. A child you have loved and cared for may have a biological family, an Indigenous governing body, and a legal guardian — the Director of Child and Family Services — all with different views on what the right path forward looks like.

The NWT's legal framework gives Indigenous communities significant authority over these decisions, particularly under Bill C-92 and for communities that have established their own Indigenous laws. For a non-Indigenous foster parent who has formed a deep attachment to an Indigenous child, understanding this framework in advance — rather than discovering it when a permanency decision is being made — is essential.

The Northwest Territories Foster Care Guide covers the permanency planning process in the NWT in full — including how custom adoption works in practice, what subsidized adoption involves, how to approach the ESSA conversation with an aging youth, and how to navigate the intersection of your attachment to the child and the legal priorities of the Indigenous community they belong to.

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