A new bill in the California Legislature seeks to clarify just when mandated reporters need to alert child welfare authorities.
Witnessing a domestic violence incident alone doesn’t necessarily need to trigger a report to authorities, it says.
That’s not to say a mandated reporter can’t still alert child welfare authorities if they believe the child is neglected or abused; it just says witnessing a potential domestic violence incident alone does not need to trigger a report.
The goal, proponents of SB 1126 say, is to keep children with their parents, particularly with those who protect them.
“Oftentimes, domestic violence situations can be messy, and what often happens — particularly in minority communities and Black and Brown communities — is the survivor, the victim of domestic violence, is the one who loses custody because the child has been present in the instance of domestic violence,” said Sen. Dave Min, D-Irvine, the bill’s sponsor.
“By making it explicit and clear that mandated reporters don’t need to report just on the basis of being present in domestic violence, this allows for more discretion and hopefully will prevent families from being taken apart,” Min added.
With looming threats that they could lose their child, even temporarily, or be charged with child neglect, oftentimes domestic violence victims opt against reporting abuse, said Chris Negri, the associate director of public policy strategies at the California Partnership to End Domestic Violence. (The coalition has signed on to support the bill.)
And abusers can use that threat — the fear that their children will be taken away — to coerce victims from reporting abuse, he said.
“The current system is really…
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