This story is part of CT Mirror Explains, an ongoing effort to distill our wide-ranging reporting into a "what you need to know" format and provide practical information to our readers.
During the Connecticut General Assembly’s annual legislative session, which adjourned last month, lawmakers passed a bill that makes a long list of changes to the Department of Children and Families. And it had full-throated support from both sides of the aisle.
The effort to both support and regulate DCF comes at a time when the department is being criticized for its handling of several recent tragedies involving children.
Here’s what to know:
Why is the bill needed?
Over the past year, a series of tragedies involving children in DCF care have come to public attention. Then, in April, a public letter from the Office of the Child Advocate expressed alarm at yet another child death. In that case, a child in DCF care asked a DCF worker to be placed in foster care during a home visit; The worker said no, and the child died in an apparent suicide less than an hour later. The letter also detailed drops in the quality of casework at DCF, including significant declines in the frequency of in-person visits with adults and children.
DCF has new leadership under Susan Hamilton, who previously served as the agency’s commissioner. Hamilton has pledged transparency and urgency in meeting challenges faced by the agency. But families, advocates, and newly confirmed Child Advocate Christina Ghio say that more must be done.
What’s in H.B. 5004?
The bill lawmakers passed this year, H.B. 5004, includes two dozen provisions that range from new grants for families to new oversight for the agency.
Some elements of the bill are intended to bring new workers into the pipeline to address significant staff turnover at the agency, while others were created to address recent tragedies, like the death of 11-year-old Jacqueline “Mimi” Torres-García, who died of malnutrition and abuse, and whose mother hid her death from DCF by telling a worker she was visiting a relative out of state and then faking a video call.
The bill’s provisions include:
- New grants: The grants will provide funds for clothes, food and safety supplies; the cost of afterschool programs; as well as a new education grant program for young people who were adopted before turning 18 and remain in DCF care after turning 18.
- Wearable emergency communication devices: DCF must now provide employees with devices to bring along on home visits, which they can use to call police if they’re in danger.
- More transparency for DCF: A new public-facing website and a public awareness campaign about DCF resources are aimed at improving the agency’s relationship with the public.
- DCF workforce support: Staff will be required to attend trainings on perinatal mood and anxiety disorders, cultural sensitivity, human trafficking and implicit bias. The bill also created new mentorship and internship programs for those just starting out at the agency.
- Procedural changes: The bill makes changes to certain procedures involving kin, out of state travel, and children’s opinions. While most children are placed with relatives or fictive kin when possible, those placements will now be required in emergency situations. When such a placement does not happen, DCF will now be required to document the reason why. DCF will be required to take children’s expressed opinions into account during home visits. And, the bill creates a new protocol for when children under the agency’s supervision are taken out of state that requires parents to notify the agency if the relocation lasts for more than two weeks. If the parent does not do so, DCF must undertake a series of actions including contacting the local child welfare or law enforcement agency to do an in-person welfare check.
- Oversight committee: The bill created a new 32-member Child Welfare Policy and Oversight Committee, which will make recommendations about DCF operations and policies, while also evaluating existing committees and boards that deal with child welfare.
Does the bill regulate homeschooling?
No, the bill does not regulate homeschooling.
A separate bill, House Bill 5468, created some regulations. That bill requires parents to say how they wish to educate their children each year — public school, private school or homeschooling. It requires homeschooling parents to appear in-person to withdraw their children for homeschooling and to pass a one-time background check with DCF.
