Fingerprinted Like a Villian?

Being fingerprinted brings to mind dingy cells, mug shots, and handcuffs. So, I was pleasantly surprised by our experience at Hands Across the Water, which is off Carpenter Road in Ann Arbor.

An envelope from DHS (Department of Human Services) arrived in the mail about two weeks after my husband, Matt, and I attended foster parent orientation. It enclosed instructions on how to get finger printed. Every prospective foster parent must be finger printed as a part of the comprehensive background check which is preformed to ascertain whether you are sick and creepy or relatively normal.

The letter contained form and receipts that we were to bring to the finger printing location. The receipts contained codes to show the fingerprinter that our fingerprinting had already been paid for by DHS- to the tune of $58.00 each. It told us when and where we should go. The hours were pathetic, (10-2 on 2 or 3 different week days) and the directions were terrible. But, on the Tuesday afternoon that I went in, I was pleasantly surprised.

I arrived at Hands Across the Water, waited about five minutes in a small but cozy waiting room, and was called into an office by a sixty-ish man with a ponytail. Gone are the days of messy ink, this task was completed with no paper or ink whatsoever. The man had me place each finger on a small scanner, and my fingerprints appeared on the computer screen. They didn’t show up very well at first. So, he had me use hand sanitizer and then lotion to get a better image. The computer read my prints and blinked red or green to show if the image was acceptable. After five minutes or so we were done. The fingerprints were in the computer ready to be screened, and I was saying my good byes and heading to a dentist appointment. I called Matt with much better directions on how to find the place. His experience was similar to mine. We filled out our papers and sent them in to DHS.