Ceremony shines light on need for teen adoptions

Name: Growing need for teen adoption
Uploaded: 2025-03-21T11:14:08-04:00
Description: Photojournalist Barry Wong reports.

Growing need for teen adoption

Photojournalist Barry Wong reports.

SAFETY HARBOR, Fla. - To celebrate Teen Adoption Day (March 14) and National Teenager Day (March 21), 10 teens were legally adopted at a ceremony held by Family Support Services (FSS) of Pasco & Pinellas Counties.

What they're saying:

"We are so excited to do what we think is the first ever teens-only adoption event in the state," Family Support Services President Jenn Petion said.

Three siblings will remain together, adopted by Sebastian Montenegro and his husband. A staff member recommended the trio’s case, believing that the connection would be a good fit.

Sebastian Montenegro and his husband adopted three siblings: 17-year-old Ari, 10-year-old David and 7-year-old Ben.

"We met the kids and, yeah, she was right," Montenegro said. "We loved them since the very first moment we met them, and here we are eight months later."

Montenegro says the three kids all have different personalities. Seventeen-year-old Ari, 10-year-old David and 7-year-old Ben had lots of laughs and some happy tears as the judge finalized their adoptions.

"It was just how loving they were, how open to being… they wanted to have parents. They want to have someone in their lives, and just the openness that they expressed since the very first moment, it was all for us," Montenegro said.

Sebastian Montenegro and his husband adopted three siblings: 17-year-old Ari, 10-year-old David and 7-year-old Ben.

While adopting three was not in the original plan for Montenegro and his husband, adopting an older child always was. The adopted trio fall into multiple categories for kids that stay in the foster system for a longer period: older age and siblings. FSS is constantly recruiting families for those situations.

"It is very, very needed," Montenegro said. "So, I'm a numbers person. I work with numbers, and having a kid age out of foster care lowers their probability of being successful in life. So, changing the lives of these kids is just something that is priceless."

A common worry that FSS faces is the potential cost of higher education, but staff members say that most adopted children and teens qualify for free in-state tuition.

An adoption ceremony was held by Family Support Services (FSS) of Pasco & Pinellas Counties.

For Montenegro and the new family, they’ll face those questions in the future. For now, they’re celebrating the moment that they’ve waited months for.

"We're just happy to make this, you know, final and just give them some, I don't know what the word is, but just making sure that they are safe, right," Montenegro said. "Give them that gift of safety that this is a permanent placement, and that we're just a family and that's it, there's no going back."