Agency must continue to honor its contract to provide adoption assistance to child

This matter involved the denial of Title IV-E adoption assistance benefits for a child whose previous adoptive parent had passed away. The Division of Family and Children Services (DFCS) denied the new adoptive parents’ application for renewed benefits, on the grounds that the contract reached between DFCS and the former adoptive parent eight years earlier had been based on the erroneous determination that the child had been eligible for Title IV-E benefits at that time. However, the Court concluded there was insufficient evidence to show this contract had been based on a mistake. Thus, DFCS could not avoid its contractual obligation to continue treating the child in question as eligible for Title IV-E benefits.