State Reps. Angela Rigas (R-Caledonia) and Luke Meerman (R-Coopersville) this week pressed representatives from the Michigan Department of Health and Human Services (MDHHS) this during testimony focused on last year’s report by the Office of the Auditor General (OAG). The report focuses on Children’s Protective Services (CPS) and MDHHS’s ability to perform investigations regarding child abuse and neglect. The OAG found that MDHHS was routinely failing to perform adequate criminal history and CPS history checks on households while performing investigations due to policy changes.

“Those are pretty serious deficiencies there,” said Rigas during the testimony. “Changing this policy, how did anyone think that a less restrictive policy would better protect children who are suspected or being abused or neglected in the first place?”

Rigas also pointed out that state law requires an investigation to be commenced on a report within 24 hours of receiving a report, but that MDHHS policy only requires investigators to make contact with alleged child victims within 72 hours. Representatives from the department told Rigas that state law doesn’t define what the commencement of an investigation is.

“That’s alarming,” Rigas told the department. The OAG’s audit noted that, even with the 72-hour timeframe, MDHHS still failed to meet their own deadlines 11% of the time.

“When it comes to the lives of vulnerable, innocent children who are being abused, every minute counts,” Rigas said after the subcommittee hearing. “It’s inexcusable that someone can report a child being abused, and three days later, someone still hasn’t shown up to make sure that child is okay. This is an issue that needs to be fixed, now.”

Last year’s audit followed up on a scathing 2018 report that found severe issues with how CPS conducted their business. The Auditor General’s report last year found that CPS had demonstrated at most only partial compliance with the corrective actions recommended from their 2018 assessment. Meerman, who chairs the subcommittee, felt the lack of compliance was alarming.

“The job of CPS is to protect children from abuse and neglect, and there are few, if any, responsibilities that government has that are more important,” Meerman said. “This is why House leadership decided to form a whole subcommittee devoted just to this subject. The longer issues persist within our safety net for children, the more innocent children will be harmed.”

At Tuesday’s committee meeting, the Auditor General’s office provided a summary of CPS’s ongoing problems that have not been resolved. They detailed a number of alarming and still recurring incidents where children were permitted to remain in a household with potential child abusers or other criminals, as well as investigations that were not completed in time to ensure children’s safety.

“Arguably no other public body in Michigan has received worse audit results than CPS, and arguably with no other government service are the consequences of failure more severe,” Meerman said. “This problem has gone unaddressed for too long. This is an area where legislative oversight is desperately needed, and today was a quality first step towards providing that.”

Both the Auditor General’s office and CPS will return to next week’s Child Welfare System Subcommittee meeting for further testimony.

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