By Emily Previti | Pennsylvania Capital-Star
State lawmakers are considering changing the legal definitions of child abuse and neglect to avoid prosecuting people who allow children in their care to engage in certain activities independently.
Supporters say the proposal could help prevent overreach by child protective services, which disproportionately affects working and non-white families.
The measure would amend child abuse and neglect definitions to clarify that parents or guardians must have shown willful or reckless disregard for obvious danger.
It also specifies that it is legal to let children do things alone such as play outside, babysit and go to and from school, the store or recreation facilities.
Families are currently penalized for exactly that, according to Mariel Mussack, staff attorney at the unemployment unit and youth justice project with Community Legal Services of Philadelphia.
Mussack said clients of hers and others at CLS have suffered severe consequences from dealing with investigations stemming from what many would regard as routine situations.
“These incidents obviously can disrupt a family’s entire life and lead to lifelong consequences for parents related to their housing, their employment and their rights to parent their children. In addition, the time and cost of litigation for parents to defend themselves in these proceedings, even where they are successful in the end, can be so exorbitant,” Mussack said. “And even where a CPS investigation results in an unfounded report, the trauma to the family can be very extensive.”
Mussack recalled a client who left her one-year-old daughter briefly in the care of her 13-year-old son and, despite the children being fine, ultimately had to fight child abuse accusations. Mussack noted the Red Cross in Pennsylvania offers babysitting training to kids 11 and older.
She and her client eventually prevailed. But in the interim, the single mother landed on a child abuse registry – making it hard for her to find work as a home health aide.
Stories like that lead to many parents feeling afraid to let their kids do things independently “that would have been seen as completely normal in the past,” Mussack testified during a hearing before the House Children and Youth Committee Monday.
Minority Chairwoman Kate Klunk (R-York) recalled her own experiences babysitting as a 13-year-old. She said Mussack’s anecdote was “appalling.”
“We live in a society where we ultimately are bubble wrapping our kids for the sake of additional bubble wrap, and it’s not actually helping them in any way,” Klunk said. “It’s actually suffocating them. And so we need to rip off that bubble wrap, let our kids be kids. Let our parents be parents.”
Committee Chair Jeanne McNeill (D-Lehigh) is sponsoring the bill along with representatives Rick Krajewski (D-Philadelphia) and Dave Zimmerman (R-Berks/Lehigh).
“These simple activities, you know, like kids playing outside, walking a sibling to school or being home alone should not be treated as neglect or endangerment,” said Krajewski, who recalled doing just that after school as a kid while his mother was working. “Merely allowing a child to be outside of constant supervision by an adult has led to frivolous Child Protection investigations, traumatizing children and families, and contributing to a climate of fear in our communities.”
There’s no timeline for the committee to consider the bill for an initial vote.
Community Legal Services developed the bill with Let Grow, an advocacy organization co-founded by Free-Range Kids author Lenore Skenazy and Boston College Professor Peter Gray behind similar legislation in other states.
Of the 11 states with laws on the books, Pennsylvania’s House Bill 18-73 draws some of its language from Georgia, Colorado and Virginia.
Pennsylvania Capital-Star is part of States Newsroom, a nonprofit news network supported by grants and a coalition of donors as a 501c(3) public charity. Pennsylvania Capital-Star maintains editorial independence. Contact Editor Tim Lambert for questions: info@penncapital-star.com.
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