Hello. Thank you for taking your time to read and possibly respond.
I married a woman almost 8 years ago who had 2 children, ages 1 year and 4 years. The biological father lives in Houston and has very minimal contact, due to his own accord (has seen them once in 3 years). He is over $10,000 in arears. For the past year, the younger child (now a 9 year old girl) has wanted to change her birth last name to mine. She says she feels like an outsider and wants the last name of her mother, father, and her sister. She gets very upset when she talks about it. The problems lies in the fact that we cannot locate the bio father. As such, the courts have tried to serve him papers to bring him back to our area to "talk" about the child support issues, but they cannot locate him so we have no way of even asking about adoption, much less a name change.
I would really like to fulfill the wishes of my daughter. The question is: Can I do it without the bio father permission? What steps do I need to take?
Thank you for your time!

