RI Senate Bill 2136

Legislation

State: Rhode Island
Signed: July 21, 2020

Effective: January 01, 2021
Chapter: 59

Summary
Senate Bill 2136 repeals Rhode Island’s current state law regarding paternity and replaces it with the Uniform Parentage Act.

Affects

Repeals and replaces Chapter 15-8 of Title 15 in the Rhode Island General Laws.

Changes

Requires the department of vital records to develop an acknowledgment of parentage form and denial of parentage form for execution of parentage.
Provides that a gamete bank or fertility clinic licensed in RI shall give a donor the choice to sign a notarized declaration that either (1) states the donor agrees to disclose the donor's identity to a child conceived by assisted reproduction with the donor's gametes on request once the child attains 18 years of age, or (2) states the donor does not agree presently to disclose the donor's identity to the child.
Requires a gamete bank or fertility clinic licensed in RI to permit a donor who has signed a notarized declaration regarding identity disclosure to withdraw the declaration at any time by signing a new declaration regarding identity disclosure.

Analysis

The Uniform Parentage Act simplifies the establishment of legal parentage for LGBTQ, unmarried couples and other individuals who rely on assisted reproduction and surrogacy by providing new paths to legal parentage in circumstances of birth, adoption, acknowledgment, adjudication, genetics, assisted reproduction, surrogacy, de facto parentage, and presumptions of parentage.

The law creates a new statutory disclosure requirement that gamete banks and fertility clinics provide donors with identity disclosure information, and obtain a signed and notarized declaration from each donor regarding that identity disclosure.

Read Senate Bill 2136.