After this autumn’s revelation of a child sex abuse scandal at Penn State University, children’s advocates are renewing their calls for the General Assembly to create a task force to overhaul the Commonwealth’s child abuse laws.
Scott Hollander, Executive Director of KidsVoice, said that he supports an upcoming measure from Westmoreland County Senator Kim Ward to create such a task force.
“It would be people appointed by the governor’s office, the House, the Senate, and there would be use of experts in the field — pediatricians, child advocates,” said Hollander. “They would look at these issues, conduct hearings over a six-month period, and come back with recommendations for overall addressing what the changes should be, to look at who should report, what should be reported, and to whom.”
Advocates point to Pennsylvania’s lower than average rate of investigation into child abuse reports, citing the state’s stringent definition of child abuse as a prime factor. Cathleen Palm, Executive Director of the Protect Our Children Committee, said that Pennsylvania authorities investigate less than one percent of child abuse reports, while the national rate is just more than 4%.
“It’s a reflection of what our law says is and is not child abuse,” said Palm. “So, it’s probably long past time that we take a look and say, ‘What is, in our collective community wisdom, what is and what is not child abuse, and is it time to look at that?’”
Several bills to reform Pennsylvania’s child abuse laws have emerged in recent weeks, in both the House and the Senate. The measures would spread the onus of reporting child abuse to more individuals, and increase the penalties for witholding information. Hollander said that each of the bills is incomplete.
“They’re a rush to address one type of situation,” said Hollander, “and it’s understandable. There’s been tremendous public outrage about that situation. But in doing that, it really requires a more thorough, comprehensive look at what the law should be for all situations.”
In addition to Senator Ward’s bill, Representative Jake Wheatley also called on the legislature to enact a child abuse reform commission. Palm said that such a commission is necessary to look at the many important questions that have long surrounded state law.
“What should we be doing? Is our definition [of child abuse] okay? Is our definition in need of changing?” asked Palm. “The way we report child abuse, could we enhance it? Should we be doing investigations differently? These are fundamental questions, and kids were potentially paying the consequence of our inaction on them long before we knew about Penn State.”
She said that advocates have been urging the legislature to create a task force since April. Senator Ward has been drafting her bill since August.
‘False’ Claims
Both Palm and Hollander denounced child protection advocate Richard Wexler’s claim that 75% of child abuse reports are false.
Palm said that there’s an important difference between a child abuse report being unsubstantiated by authorities and being totally unfounded.
“I would challenge folks who aren’t comfortable with understanding this to talk to the school nurse, who makes a report about a child who has a broken arm, or has serious welts on their body, but because the definition of child abuse is such a high threshold, that becomes an unsubstantiated report,” said Palm.
Palm said that 15 percent of child abuse investigations are substantiated in Pennsylvania, but that does not mean that the other 85 percent of cases were not child abuse.
Comments
I’ve been saying this for years. I Need to be On this Task Force. Please read the story o have linked here and you will understand why I make this statement. TY
http://www.philadelphiaweekly.com/news-and-opinion/cover-story/Man-Seeks…
75 percent of reports nationally, and 85 percent in Pennsylvania are indeed false. And that figure is almost certainly an underestimate. Of course workers sometimes will err and wrongly conclude that abuse didn’t happen. But a major federal study found that caseworkers were two to six times more likely to wrongly substantiate a case than to wrongly declare a case unfounded. Details are on our website here: http://is.gd/TPQdHS
In contrast, notice how Palm offers no evidence, she just says you should go find someone to tell you a horror story. Legislation-by-horror-story is what’s made such a mess of American child welfare for decades.
Also, caseworkers do not have to prove anything before substantiating a case. There is no court hearing before hand. It’s simply the worker’s own judgment – she checks a box on a form.
Pennsylvania’s definition of child abuse is plenty broad. It includes:
“(i.) any recent act or failure to act by a perpetrator that causes non accidental serious physical injury to a child less than 18 years old; (ii.) an act or failure to act by a perpetrator that causes non accidental serious mental injury to or sexual abuse or sexual exploitation of a child less than 18 years old; (iii.) any act or failure to act or series of such acts or failure to act by a perpetrator which creates an imminent risk of serious physical injury to or sexual abuse or sexual exploitation of a child less than 18 years old; (iv.) serious physical neglect by a perpetrator constituting prolonged or repeated lack of supervision or the failure to provide the essentials of life, including adequate medical care, which endangers a child’s life or development or impairs the child’s functioning.”
But it doesn’t stop there. Anything not covered by that definition still can be investigated under the much broader definitions for “general protective services” The 49 other states don’t draw this distinction when reporting rates of “child abuse” or rates at which “child abuse” is investigated. They lump together what Pennsylvania records separately as “child protective services” and “general protective services.” That’s why Pennsylvania’s rate for investigating “child abuse” looks low.
Furthermore, when it comes to the ultimate sanction, tearing apart families, Pennsylvania takes away children at a rate *above* the national average - still more evidence that any claim Pennsylvania is less aggressive about investigating child abuse is nonsense.
Richard Wexler
Executive Director
National Coalition for Child Protection Reform
www.nccpr.org