In February I wrote about the Health and Human Services omnibus bills. If you’ve been keeping up with the goings on in the Minnesota House and Senate, you know there has been a need for consensus before moving forward with what will make it in to the final Health and Human Services appropriations bill. The Health and Human Services Conference Committee had been meeting regularly to try and reach agreement on the different versions of the house and senate finance bills. Last week the final negotiated version of the bill was signed by the Governor. This post will outline the final version of the bill and will also include areas that were left out of the final text. You can also view the progression of the bill over the past few months here.
Duty to Protect
This sections pertains to the implementation of background studies and reimbursement of costs for child protection workers, social services staff, and group residential housing.
Child Fatality
The two versions of the bill had identical subdivisions on the creation of a review team to address child fatality and near fatality cases that occurred because of maltreatment in licensed facilities due to unnatural causes. This added subdivision was upheld in the final version. The entire child protection process will be assessed and reviewed by the team and they must focus on “the involvement of the child and family with the county or tribal child welfare agency.” The team, whose members are not detailed in the bill, will also report areas for improvement and will provide this information to the MN child mortality review panel.
Reducing Child Welfare Disparities
A grant program will be established to provide funding to organizations and agencies wanting to make programmatic changes and implement evaluation procedures to address racial disparities and disproportionalities. This section emphasizes the use of strategies that consider cultural beliefs, values and practices within the family, community, and tribe. It also focuses on maintaining connections between children and parents, siblings, other children, kin, “significant others,” and tribes. It establishes a state-community partnership plan, process, grant program criteria, evaluation and identification of measurable outcomes. Lastly, subdivision 7 details funding for American Indian child welfare projects. All of this will be done in partnership with “the legislative task force on child protection, culturally based community organizations, the Indian Affairs Council, the Council on Affairs of Chicano/Latino People, the Council on Black Minnesotans, the Council on Asian-Pacific Minnesotans, the American Indian Child Welfare Advisory Council, counties, and tribal governments.”
Child Protection Grant Programs
Detailed in a previous post the final version of the bill will establish a formula for calculating grant funding toward child protection. Both versions of the bill included this provision. The formula for county staffing funds will be based on the number of children in the county, number of screened-in reports, and number of open child protection case management cases and will be given based on performance outcomes.
Further included in this section is funding for children receiving Northstar kinship assistance in the case of a death or other circumstance that incapacitates their relative custodian. It allows for the appointment of a successor guardian and details the process and requirements for assigning such a person. If no successor is named, a child may still receive assistance if he/she has been appointed a guardian or custodian by the court and the commissioner gives written consent to this individual.
Tribal Customary Adoptions
Under “certain agency costs; purchase of service contracts” both versions have been amended to include tribal customary adoptions. The grant contracts would allow reimbursement for “child specific recruitment and adoption placement services for children under the jurisdiction of tribal court.”
Early Intervention for At-Risk American Indian Families
The final legislation was amended to include early intervention and support services for at risk American Indian families. Eligibility criteria will be established for those providing these services.
Child and Youth Out-Of-Home Placement/ Independent Living Plan
Documentation must now be made detailing the reasons why it is not within the best interests of the child to live with their primary caregiver and details should be given as to the “reasonable efforts” to establish a kinship placement, efforts to discuss adoption with the child’s relative foster parent and efforts to discuss with the child’s parents the process of transferring permanent legal and physical custody. Northstar kinship assistance eligibility must now be included. Furthermore, the child must have regular opportunities to engage in developmentally appropriate activities. Children age 16 (previously 12) must be asked about their desired permanency outcome if permanent custody to the agency is being considered.
Protecting children at risk of sex trafficking
New language was added on protecting missing and runaway children and youth that may be at risk of sex trafficking. Social services agencies must now report to law enforcement no later than 24 hours after receiving information on a missing or abducted child. This section also includes factors that contributed to why the child ran away and any reason they may believe the child may be at risk of sex trafficking.
Amended Definitions
Many term definitions have been amended. The definition of family assessment will be the response for reports that do not include alleged sexual abuse, and the term investigations will be used when reports involve sexual abuse. The definition of substantial child endangerment has been changed by omitting the follow language referring to sexual abuse: “and in the case of sexual abuse includes a person who has a significant relationship to the child…or a person in a position of authority…” this was previously only included in the house version of the bill and it has now been incorporated into the final legislation. Both the House and Senate had omitted language defining that physical abuse must be done “in anger or without regard to the safety of the child.” This was also upheld in the final legislation.
The house version had amended the definition of report by clarifying that a report is any “communication” by local child welfare agency, police department, county sheriff, or other agency that is responsible to report instances of maltreatment. It is added to this definition that the reporter must have sufficient information to identify the child and any person that they believe may have caused the harm. This definition was not amended in the senate version but was adopted in conference committee and is now a part of the final legislation.
Mandated and Voluntary Reporting and Screening Guidelines
Voluntary reporting has been added to the subdivision on mandated reporting. It includes reporting to tribal social services agencies, and/or tribal police department in addition to child welfare agencies, and local police departments. The language including tribal social services agencies and tribal police departments is included throughout.
The bill emphasizes mandatory guidelines for screening reports. The guidance will be provided in the Minnesota Child Maltreatment Screening Guidelines and must follow all protocols as they are updated. Any modifications to the guidelines will be approved ahead of time by the commissioner and guidelines must always be in agreement with statute.
Cross Reporting
Mandatory notification between the police or county sheriff and agency is added to subdivision under duties upon receipt of a report. Immediate notification between the police department or county sheriff must be done either in writing and orally. This must be done when the alleged maltreatment occurred on tribal land as well and the tribe’s social services agency and police department must be notified.
Release of Data
Data will be provided to the mandated reporter who made the initial report unless it is deemed not in the best interests of the child. The reporter receiving the data must comply with the level of sensitivity required to protect private data regardless of whether or not they work for a government agency.
When the report outcome is determined, the mandated reporter now will receive a summary of their report as well as the outcome determination. When determining track assignment, the agency must consider previous history including past screened out reports. Screened out reports will be maintained for 5 years.
Supervisor Training
The commissioner will provide trainings, and institute requirements and competencies specific to child protection supervisors. These will be based on the Minnesota Child Welfare Practice Model and will aim to increase skills that incorporate client culture and values.
Note: definitions for sibling/relative and successor guardian came from PL 113-183, the Preventing Sex Trafficking and Strengthening Families Act.
