House approves bills aimed at CPS reform

The state House gave overwhelming approval Wednesday to a package of bills aimed at reforming the state's child welfare system, mostly by opening it up to public scrutiny. The measures now go to the governor, who is expected to sign them.

Sponsored by Rep. Kirk Adams, R-Mesa, and Rep. Jonathan Paton, R-Tucson, the bills were in response to the deaths of three Tucson children involved with Child Protective Services.

"If you read the case files and see the torture that those children went through, it certainly moves within you a great desire to make sure this never happens again," Adams said after the bills were passed.

The measures require public release of CPS records in the most severe cases of abuse or neglect, tighter coordination with law enforcement in criminal cases, public access to child dependency hearings and release of state employee disciplinary records.

Greater openness, Adams and Paton argue, will lead to further reforms in an agency largely shrouded in secrecy.

Already, they said, policy changes have come from the publicity surrounding the deaths of Brandon Williams and Tyler and Ariana Payne. Newspapers sued to get access to the children's CPS records.

"We can never bring them back, but we can try to bring back the public's faith in their government by making it as open, as transparent and as accountable to the people of this state as we can," Paton said in a floor speech.

CPS administrators this session supported competing measures that have stalled, but also worked with Paton and Adams on their legislation.

Ken Deibert, who oversees CPS as a deputy director for the state Department of Economic Security, said the agency supports the bills. But he added that investigations have risen 6 percent since last year and CPS needs an additional 200 employees to lower caseloads to meet state and national standards.

"When you pass legislation that impacts our workload ... that becomes very challenging to us," Deibert said. "You're putting additional standards and expectations on a system that's already challenged."

Adams and Paton held hearings in fall and reviewed CPS and employee records. Child welfare officials admitted that they made mistakes leading up to the deaths, but said at the time that high caseloads were largely to blame.

Some lawmakers and advocates agreed Wednesday, saying the changes could be meaningless if caseworkers lack the time and resources to fully investigate and help families.

"If we truly want to save children's lives ... we will put our money where our mouth is," said Rep. Ed Ableser, D-Tempe. "Because we're not giving the resources to these agencies to truly prevent these things from happening."

A handful of legislators said they remained concerned that opening CPS records could harm children, particularly in smaller communities, if the abuse or neglect became public.

"I worry about the media publicizing that type of information," said Rep. Pete Rios, D-Dudleyville, the sole vote against HB2454. "Especially in rural communities, where everybody knows everybody else."

CPS records in child fatalities or near-fatalities, now reduced to short summaries if released at all, would be open to the public unless prosecutors could show that such release would cause "specific, material harm" to their investigation.

Current law has been interpreted to give attorneys wide latitude to keep records secret, and CPS hasn't released a file without a court order in many years.

In the case of Mesa 2-year-old C.J. Young, for example, CPS records have never been released, though the agency acknowledged that caseworkers had been closely involved with the boy and his family for more than a decade.

C.J. was beaten to death in August 2003. His mother is serving a 17-year sentence for child abuse.

The new law, however, would still allow prosecutors to withhold records when children die and require the media or the public to sue to get them.

The Arizona Child Fatality Review Team classified 60 deaths in 2006 as maltreatment. Twenty-one of those children were in families that had prior CPS involvement and nine of those families had open CPS cases when the child died.

The state employees' union enthusiastically supported the bill to open disciplinary records, but only after the measure was amended to include the worker's response to their punishment.

"What we're trying to do here is to get the whole package," said Roman Ulman, political director for the local chapter of the American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees. "It allows us to find out whether all employees are being treated equally."

Adams and Paton issued a subpoena to look at the files of three Tucson CPS workers, but only after promising to keep what they saw confidential. Adams said he was "shocked" at what he saw.

The bill requiring joint investigations was amended considerably over the past several months, taking out provisions that would put county prosecutors in charge of CPS abuse investigations, including decisions about whether children should be reunited with their families.

It now requires county attorneys to coordinate the rules for joint investigations, similar to what occurred after the last round of CPS reforms in 2003.

Gov. Janet Napolitano created a committee and called a special session following several high-profile abuse cases. The bills passed five years ago tackled some of the very same issues.

Napolitano already has signed two Adams-Paton bills: One measure would require CPS to issue a "missing persons" report if a child is likely to be harmed and the other requires workers to find and abide by court orders.

In the case of 5-year-old Brandon Williams, a Pima County sheriff's deputy saw the boy the day before he died and was concerned enough about him to file a report. But she didn't know CPS was looking for him.

Napolitano is expected to sign the bills, though her office has a policy of not commenting on bills until she acts on them.

"She's got five days to consider these bills and she will make her decision and will announce it at the appropriate time," said gubernatorial spokeswoman Jeanine L'Ecuyer.

CPS bills at a glance:

HB2159: Makes state employee disciplinary records public, including responses from workers who are disciplined approved 51-5; awaits governor's signature

HB2453: Allows public into dependency hearings approved 54-2; awaits governor's signature

HB2454: Opens CPS records in fatality and near-fatality cases approved 57-1; awaits governor's signature

HB2455: Tightens requirements for CPS and law enforcement to work together on child abuse cases, makes CPS records open in fatality and near-fatality cases, and requires an annual report on joint investigations approved 58-0; awaits governor's signature

HB2594: Requires CPS workers to locate and abide by court orders signed

HB2599: Requires CPS to file missing person's report on children at risk of "serious harm" signed

To read the bills, go to www.azleg.gov