KENTUCKY — According to the Cabinet for Health and Family Services, Kentucky currently has more than 8,000 children in the foster care system.

Through adoption, many foster parents choose to become the permanent and legal adoptive parents of children who have been in their approved foster homes.

During this In Focus Kentucky segment, House Republican Speaker Pro Tem David Meade talks about the process of adoption in his family.

"It means a lot to me. It's a special place in my heart because I'm an adopted father. My daughter was adopted from Korea. And the reason we decided to go internationally at the time was because you hear all those horror stories about the adoption process here locally, in our state and across the country in many places. And so I just, I had a passion for that," said Meade.

Speaker Pro Tem Meade also shares updates about the ongoing work in the state legislature to improve adoption in Kentucky.

"When Republicans came into the majority in 2017, and I came into the House in 2013, when I was first elected, I had worked on adoption laws and bills. We really didn't have much movement on that until 2017 when Speaker Jeff Hoover established the Adoption Task Force and I was chairing that and we came up with legislation in 2018. It was about a year and a half process that Representative Joni Jenkins (D-Shively) and I worked together on this as a bipartisan effort. We came out with a large reform package. It's the largest package that we've ever had in our state's history with our child welfare, adoption and foster care process," adds Meade.

You can watch the full In Focus segment in the player above.