Two years ago, as the pandemic raged all around her, a Brooklyn mother of three had a terrifying visit to her home — a child welfare worker investigating an anonymous report to New York’s child protection hotline claiming she had starved her kids.
Over the coming months, a caseworker from New York City’s Administration for Children and Families repeatedly showed up unannounced to Shalonda Curtis Hackett’s apartment, inspecting the refrigerator and bedrooms while her children stood by and watched. Hackett said the caseworker never informed her she could refuse entry or have a lawyer present.
“What was told to me was that if I didn’t allow her to come inside, she would come with the police,” she said in an interview.
The hotline report claiming Hackett mistreated her children was found to be unsubstantiated. But the terror surrounding the investigation — a story first reported by ProPublica and NBC News — remains acute for Hackett and countless others experiencing similar CPS investigations in New York City.
Efforts to better inform parents and eliminate anonymous reports to the Statewide Central Register of Child Abuse and Maltreatment would change that. For yet another year, public interest lawyers, child welfare advocates and parent activists are pushing for passage of two bills now moving through the state Legislature.
Similar legislation that has failed to pass in previous years has now moved to the state Senate’s Children and Families Committee. Senate Bill S901 would require social workers to inform parents of their due process rights at the beginning of an investigation for child maltreatment, similar to Miranda rights read to people being arrested. Senate Bill S902 requires hotline callers reporting suspected child abuse or maltreatment to leave their name and contact information. To protect their identities, it would also prohibit the state’s Office of Children and Family Services from releasing information identifying a person who made such a report.
Both bills are authored by state Sen. Jabari Brisport (D) and have yet to make it to the Senate floor. Lawmakers have until June 8 to pass all bills through the committee for a final vote.
Brisport said in an interview that it’s important for the entire family to be aware of their rights so “everyone can protect themselves” during a CPS investigation.
His legislation, “will absolutely level the playing field and allow all families to know their rights, because some families don’t, and some families do,” he said. “You end up with wealthier families knowing the rights and exercising them, and poor, Black families or families of color, not knowing their rights and not exercising them.”
The Administration for Children’s Services (ACS), the city’s child protective service agency, said they are committed to informing parents their rights and have been supportive of legislation that requires “oral and written information to parents, about their rights, at the initial point of contact.”
Marisa Kaufman, spokesperson for ACS, said, “We look forward to legislation that accounts for the need for parents to have information about their rights and the need for child welfare agencies to assess the safety of children who have been reported as possibly abused or neglected.”
At a public meeting two weeks ago, in response to a question about why his agency opposed the “Miranda” legislation, Children’s Services Commissioner Jess Dannahuser downplayed his resistance to CPS providing information to parents at the start of investigations.
“As you talk about notifications at the front door, about making sure that families know their rights, I don’t think it’s accurate to say we oppose that.”
“When in life do you want Americans not to know their rights? The only time you need them not to know their rights is when their rights are about to be violated.”
— Andrew Hevesi, ASSEMBLY MEMBER
Attorneys who represent parents in family court proceedings — where the ultimate sanction for child abuse or neglect is a termination of parental rights — say vindictive or harassing hotline calls from former spouses or misinformed observers, as well as a lack of information among those accused, is all too common in New York.
More than 44,000 investigations of abuse and neglect involving more than 68,000 households were conducted last year in New York City alone, city data shows — inquiries that disproportionately center on communities of color. According to local data published last year, 44% of all Black children in New York City and 43% of all Latino kids experienced a CPS investigation in their households before they turned 18.
An investigation by ProPublica and NBC News revealed that last year, more than 80% of children involved in New York City investigations were either Black or Hispanic. Caseworkers obtained a court order to enter family homes in just 208 of 47,648 cases, or less than .5% of the time, the outlets reported.
A caseworker interviewed by the journalists said if he and his colleagues don’t enter family homes, it’s viewed as a “failure,” and supervisors often tell them to do whatever it takes to get inside.
“If you’re engaging with a family member who is resistant, you have to make it real for them that there is a problem happening not just for me as a caseworker, but also for you as a parent. And it will actually go faster if you comply with us,” the unidentified caseworker told reporters.
Anna Arons, an assistant professor at New York University School of Law, said most of her previous parent clients did not know their rights when social workers appeared at the door.
“The most common thing I would hear from my clients when I would meet them in court is that they already let government agents into their homes, made statements, let their children speak with them and let their children go through these really invasive investigations,” Arons said. “They just didn’t know that they didn’t have to do that.”
“The power these workers have over them gets a lot of families to agree to things that they shouldn’t.”
— Jennifer Feinberg, Center for Family Representation
The New York legislation that would bar anonymous reports to the child protection hotline is co-authored by Assembly member Andrew Hevesi (D). In a press release, he stated that the anti-harassment and Miranda bills would create a “system that is fairer and keeps families together.”
At a recent rally of parents impacted by the child welfare system and their supporters, Hevesi reversed his previous stance in opposition to requiring parents under investigation be informed of their rights, saying he was “wrong.”
“When in life do you want Americans not to know their rights?” he said. “The only time you need them not to know their rights is when their rights are about to be violated.”
Speaking to critics’ concerns, Sen. Brisport said that the Miranda bill would allow exceptions when children were considered to be at imminent risk of danger.
A similar bill recently passed both houses of the far more conservative Texas state Legislature. The bill is now on the desk of Republican Gov. Greg Abbott.
After she was investigated, Hackett said she took drastic measures, withdrawing her kids from public school, and later homeschooling them due to fear of being reported by administrators. “ACS is being weaponized against families,” she said. “And we have no recourse, we just have to go through this process.”
Indeed, a report released last year by New York’s Adoptive and Foster Family Coalition, found there were an average of 150,000 hotline calls each year between 2015 to 2019, yet only 30% were found credible as to neglect.
Jennifer Feinberg, litigation supervisor for government and policy affairs at the Center for Family Representation, said terrified parents regularly waive their rights in fear of police being called if they don’t comply with social workers.
“The power these workers have over them gets a lot of families to agree to things that they shouldn’t. The system claims that they want to help families, but they push back on providing parents their rights,” she said. “Simply putting them in a situation where families are being harmed and traumatized — even if that investigation is found with no basis, which is over 70% of these cases.”
Advocates say if the pending legislation is passed, child welfare agencies will have to take a better look at who and how they investigate, reducing long-term harm to families and freeing up caseworkers to focus on the most egregious cases.
“They are less likely to violate their rights and will be more aware that they can’t threaten separation with police if a family is resisting,” Feinberg said.
Correction: This article originally noted that more than 68,000 investigations of abuse and neglect occurred in New York City last year. It has been updated to reflect that more than 44,000 investigations took place, and those investigations involved a total of about 68,000 children.
Michael Fitzgerald contributed to this report.
