Spurred by the death of a toddler named Bryanna Harris, legislators are introducing bills intended to identify parents and others who might harm children before abuse occurs, closing gaps in a system that has too often failed families in Baltimore.
Among other things, the bills would require city and county social services officials to keep track of parents with a history of abuse so that any new children they have can be protected. Some legislators want to broaden that approach through reporting systems that would identify children who come into contact with known abusers, such as pedophiles.
But the record shows that proposals such as this often go nowhere once the publicity and outrage surrounding a child's death subsides.
Four years ago, a group headed by then- Baltimore Health Commissioner Dr. Peter L. Beilenson strongly recommended reform measures similar to some of those now being proposed. As with Bryanna, they followed the death of a child - David Carr. In 2003, the newborn's skull was crushed by his mother, who had been convicted a year earlier of abusing another child.
Legislators introduced bills in 2006 and 2007 that would have matched up case workers with troubled families before, or shortly after, a new child was born. But several factors - political spats between state and city officials, budget woes and concerns that the legislation might prove too invasive to families that had rebuilt their lives - combined to kill those bills in committee.
One difference today, however, is that the Department of Human Resources, which oversees welfare services in the state, says it hopes to take some of these steps on its own.
"That's what we're trying to determine now," said department spokesman Norris West.
The department is under new leadership. Secretary Brenda Donald, a former social services administrator who worked in Washington, was named head of the agency a year ago.
Bryanna's death last year from a lethal dose of methadone led to the arrest of her mother and outrage over the city Department of Social Services' failure to prevent the tragedy.
Shortly after Vernice Harris, 29, was charged with murder this month, the city agency's director, Samuel Chambers Jr., resigned, and a supervisor in the department was demoted. Donald has ordered an investigation by the state agency's inspector general.
