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Sen. Ceci Maher, D-Wilton, speaks with Senate Majority Leader Bob Duff, D-Norwalk, during special session on November 13, 2025. Credit: Shahrzad Rasekh / CT Mirror

Legislation that will create a new oversight committee for the Connecticut Department of Children and Families — one of two dozen provisions in the bill aimed at supporting the child welfare agency and safeguarding children in its care — received final passage in the Senate on Monday.

House Bill 5004 came in the wake of a slew of tragedies involving children who were under the watch of the agency, as well as an urgent public letter from the Office of the Child Advocate last week that detailed declines in the quality of casework being done by social workers at DCF.

“This bill is an effort to perhaps rectify and also bring more transparency and more oversight and a safe environment for our children in Connecticut,” Sen. Ceci Maher of Wilton, who co-chairs the legislature’s Committee on Children, told her fellow senators on Monday. 

During her presentation of the bill, Maher zoomed in on a section that would require the opinions of children to be taken into account when DCF workers make home visits.

Maher referenced the recent letter from Acting Child Advocate Christina Ghio, which cited the “alarming” death of a child in April who asked to be put into foster care and was told by a DCF worker that wasn’t possible. Less than an hour after the visit, the child died by apparent suicide.

“I want to highlight this specifically,” Maher said, citing the recent case. “This is not okay. DCF should be taking into consideration the opinions of children during a visit when investigating claims of abuse or neglect.”

Sen. Jason Perillo, R-Shelton, called an amendment to the bill that would have required the Child Advocate to submit a report on remote work at the agency. Lawmakers and advocates have criticized the policy, under which DCF workers can work from home most of the time when they are not doing work that requires in-person contact with children and families.

The policy has come under more scrutiny in light of the death of Jacqueline “Mimi” Torres-García, an 11-year old who died of malnutrition and abuse. Torres-García’s mother told a DCF worker that her daughter was not available for an in-person visit because she was staying with a relative out of state. Then, a woman impersonated Torres-García during a video check-in with DCF. Authorities say that Torres-García was already dead at the time of the video call.

Perillo’s amendment sought to dig deeper into just how much DCF workers are working remotely and how it is impacting the agency and the children it serves.

The amendment failed. But one provision in the DCF bill would require more checks on children when they go out of state.

The bill passed unanimously. It now goes to Gov. Ned Lamont who is expected to sign it into law.

Laura Tillman is CT Mirror’s Human Services Reporter. She shares responsibility for covering housing, child protection, mental health and addiction, developmental disabilities, and other vulnerable populations. Laura began her career in journalism at the Brownsville Herald in 2007, covering the U.S.–Mexico border, and worked as a statehouse reporter for the Associated Press in Mississippi. She was most recently a producer of the national security podcast “In the Room with Peter Bergen” and is the author of two nonfiction books: The Long Shadow of Small Ghosts (2016) and The Migrant Chef: The Life and Times of Lalo Garcia (2023), which was just awarded the 2024 James Beard Award for literary writing. Her freelance work has appeared in The Wall Street Journal, New York Times and The Los Angeles Times. Laura holds a degree in International Studies from Vassar College and an MFA in nonfiction writing from Goucher College.