(vii) The expense of obtaining the information required by this paragraph is incorporated in the adoption filing fee established in section 9-301. The Probate Court shall collect the total fee and transfer the appropriate funds to the Department of Public Safety and the department.

The court may waive the background check of a prospective adoptive parent if a previous background check was completed by a court or by the department under this subsection within a reasonable period of time and the court is satisfied that nothing new that would be included in the background check has transpired since the last background check.

This subsection does not authorize the court to request a background check for the biological parent who is also the current legal parent of the child.

Sec. 2. 18-A MRSA §9-304, sub-§(a-2) is enacted to read:

(a-2)__The department may, pursuant to rules adopted by the department, at any time before the filing of the petition for adoption, conduct background checks for each prospective adoptive parent of a minor child in its custody.

(1)__The department may request a background check for each prospective adoptive parent who is not the biological parent of the child.__The background check must include criminal history record information obtained from the Maine Criminal Justice Information System and the Federal Bureau of Investigation.

(i)__The criminal history record information obtained from the Maine Criminal Justice Information System must include a record of Maine conviction data.

(ii)__The criminal history record information obtained from the Federal Bureau of Investigation must include other state and national criminal history record information.

(iii)__Each prospective parent who is not the biological parent of the child shall submit to having fingerprints taken.__The State Police, upon receipt of