Three children involved in Arizona’s child safety system died last year, and Arizona lawmakers say the deaths exposed gaps that should have been caught sooner.
Now, lawmakers are pushing a slate of reforms for the embattled Department of Child Safety and the thousands of children in its custody.
And while seemingly everyone at the Capitol agrees that something must be done, several of the bills are facing pushback from Democratic lawmakers, who argue that the package of bills could put families in the crosshairs of ICE, put teachers on the line for not noticing warning signs and put more responsibilities on the plates of already overworked social workers without giving them the tools and money needed to actually reform the agency.
At yesterday’s meeting of the Joint Legislative Oversight Committee on the Department of Child Safety, lawmakers discussed the package of bills that are nearing the governor’s desk.
The committee has only officially convened seven times since it was formed in 2017, but at Monday’s meeting, Republican Sen. Carine Werner said she has held “multiple stakeholder meetings” that hashed out policies behind closed doors throughout the last year.
The joint committee isn’t built for lawmaking. Instead, it’s a forum for legislators to hear from DCS leaders and other stakeholders, identify problems and recommend solutions.
A series of high-profile deaths last year added new urgency to the committee’s work this session:
The remains of 14-year-old Emily Pike were found after she ran away from a state-licensed group home.
Zariah Dodd, a pregnant 16-year-old, was shot and killed in a park after leaving a similar facility.
And 10-year-old Rebekah Baptiste was found dead after DCS had received multiple reports of abuse.
Lawmakers’ criticism zeroed in on a specific failure: The warning signs were there, but the agency didn’t connect the dots or act on them in time.
Now, Werner has six bills advancing through the legislative process to address the biggest issues raised in her stakeholder talks.
During Monday’s oversight hearing, she walked through each proposal, tying them directly to the failures exposed in last year’s deaths.
In Baptiste’s case, for example, school officials made 12 reports to DCS over concerns for her safety, but only one met the state’s statutory reporting threshold. Werner’s SB1127 would tighten Arizona’s mandatory reporting law.
Gov. Katie Hobbs has already signed one of Werner’s DCS reform bills, SB1125, which requires the agency to enter into agreements with tribes to share information and coordinate on child welfare cases.
Pike was in the custody of the San Carlos Apache Tribe when she ran away from a DCS-licensed group home in Mesa last year. Lawmakers say gaps in communication between the tribe and DCS left those responsible for her care without understanding the full extent of her prior abuse.
But not everyone agrees with Werner’s solutions.
Here’s what she’s proposing this year.
SB1126: DCS caseworkers; schools; required disclosures
Requires schools to provide DCS with certain student information, including who requested the student’s records and who withdrew them from school, and prohibits schools from blocking employees from speaking with DCS investigators.
While the bill passed the Senate unanimously, 17 Democrats voted against it in the House.
Democratic Rep. Nancy Gutierrez told us she’s concerned the bill allowing the release of all records could “leave students vulnerable, especially if their immigration status or their parents’ status were disclosed,” and while she doesn’t think that’s the bill’s intent, the caucus is “very cautious.”
SB1127: duty to report; abuse; neglect
Tightens Arizona’s mandatory reporting law by requiring the person with direct knowledge of suspected child abuse or neglect to report it to DCS immediately, without delegating that responsibility to someone else.
SB1127 passed the Senate unanimously and is awaiting a final House vote.
But Gutierrez, a former teacher, raised concerns that educators could face criminal liability under the new requirements if they aren’t properly trained — especially since many have been taught to report concerns to supervisors rather than directly to authorities.
SB1174: DCS; intake hotline: case history
Requires DCS hotline workers to review a child’s and siblings’ full history of prior hotline calls and investigations in one report, instead of looking at a new allegation in isolation. It also requires workers to review the last 90 days of call narratives — including calls that were previously screened out — and use that information when deciding whether a new report meets the threshold for action.
Only five Senate Democrats voted against the bill, including Sen. Rosanna Gabaldón, who called it an unfunded mandate for an already overworked agency.
SB1175: DCS caseworkers; investigations; child photographs
Requires DCS caseworkers to photograph a child every time they meet with them during an abuse or neglect investigation and keep those photos in the case file. It also requires caseworkers to review the photos when making a safety plan and take into account any visible decline in the child’s appearance or health.
Only one Democrat voted against the bill in its third Senate vote, but it passed a House committee unanimously.
SB1496: DCS; policies; procedures
Makes DCS the default manager of federal benefits, like Social Security or veterans’ benefits, for children in its custody until a more appropriate person is identified and approved to take over.
Four House Democrats opposed the bill in committee, echoing the County Supervisors Association’s concerns about an amendment requiring monthly meetings between court-appointed attorneys and children, which it said would drive up costs and strain staffing.
SB1631: DCS; sexual abuse allegations; interviews
Requires DCS to make sure a trained forensic interviewer interviews a child within 72 hours after a sexual abuse allegation is reported.
The bill passed a final Senate vote and a House committee unanimously.
Define “protect,” please: Anthony Dunham knew the bizarre punishments his ex-wife did to his kids would come up when he decided to run for a state Senate seat in Legislative District 17 on a platform of protecting children, the Republic’s Ray Stern reports. Dunham is in a child custody battle with his first ex-wife, which led to the public revelation that his second ex-wife forced his 12-year-old daughter to drink apple cider vinegar until she vomited. His two other children, age 4 and 5, had vinegar sprayed in their faces and put in their meals. They also were locked in their rooms for so long they had to pee on the floor. Dunham says that was all his second ex-wife’s doing. Republican Rep. Rachel Keshel, who is teaming up with Dunham in the competitive Tucson-area district, stepped in to defend him.
“Unless you’re Jesus running for office, you're going to get imperfect,” she told Stern.
Tangled webs: If the Dunham thing wasn’t bizarre enough for you, check out what’s happening in Scottsdale. Todd Borowsky, brother of Scottsdale Mayor Lisa Borowsky, is suing the city for what he calls a “revenge investigation” into the alleged drugging of men at the strip clubs he owns, Tom Scanlon reports for the Scottsdale Progress. More than three-dozen men sued Todd and claimed they were robbed of $2.3 million after they were drugged. Todd’s lawyers, who work at the same firm Lisa used to work at, say the drugging/robbing claims came after a law enforcement officer allegedly sexually assaulted a dancer while investigating whether dancers were violating COVID distancing restrictions in 2020. Scottsdale police bungled the investigation and officials resigned before they could face discipline. Then police drummed up a bunch of men who couldn’t remember if they actually spent all that money at the strip clubs to make the case against Todd’s strip clubs, his lawyers say.
Sleepy elections get a shot of espresso: Today’s election in the Salt River Project district is drawing in national players, like Turning Point USA, and national attention, per the Associated Press. It’s the most recent in a chain of local elections across the country that pit local residents worried about their electric bills against data center companies that want to build power plants and power lines. All that attention is translating into voter enthusiasm. Three times as many people requested early ballots for today’s election than two years ago.
Changing the formula: A group of Colorado River experts is calling for a change in how the United States shares river water with Mexico, Alex Hager reports for KJZZ. Rather than send a fixed amount every year, as is required under the current rules, the experts say the U.S. should send a percentage of the water that’s actually in the river. They also say federal officials in Mexico and the U.S. could work out such an arrangement even if the seven states that depend on the river can’t agree on how to share the water amongst themselves.
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Bills on the move: The Arizona Legislature is still hammering out legislation, including: Banning social media for teens, targeting utility costs at mobile home parks, allowing video cameras in nursing homes and forcing public school districts to let students leave class for religious instruction. And a bill that passed last year is leaving some dental students in limbo.
Today was the last day that citizens could file challenges against candidates running for office in Arizona, and as of the close of business, only five challenges were filed — which is way down from the last few years.
In 2024, there were 21 challenges filed. In 12 of those cases, the candidate being challenged was removed from the ballot or withdrew before that happened. The low number of signatures this year is likely because of the increased use of the online E-Qual system, which allows candidates to collect signatures online and rarely results in an invalid signature.
One case was already dismissed last week, as Show Low resident and Trump merch store owner Steve Slaton forgot to name a couple important parties in the lawsuit he filed against Republican Rep. Walt Blackman. What might have been an interesting case about Blackman’s outstanding fines on file for campaign finance errors was spoiled yet again by good ol’ fashioned MAGA incompetence.
The other four challenges are:
LD30 GOP House candidate David Rose is getting challenged by a woman named Jennifer Esposito, who is claiming that Rose isn’t eligible to hold office because he committed offenses in Kentucky. The court hasn’t weighed in yet.
Teri Hourihan — a candidate who is running for the gubernatorial nomination of what until recently has been called the Arizona Independent Party — is trying to disqualify the other, probably more notable candidate — entrepreneur Hugh Lytle. She claimed that her team reviewed his signatures and that only about a fifth of Lytle’s 6,000 signatures are valid. That would be an extraordinarily high invalid rate.
Hourihan is also filing a lawsuit against the Green Party candidate, Risa Lombardo, claiming Lombardo collected 2,000 invalid signatures and only has 983 valid ones. He needs 1,771 to qualify for the ballot.
Jerone Davison, a former NFL player from the Arizona Cardinals running as a Republican in Arizona’s 4th Congressional District, is being challenged by someone named Gary Darby. He believes 380 of Davison’s 1,540 signatures are invalid, which would put the Mississippi-born Republican below the number he needs. Internet investigator William Coffin found several citations against Davison for driving without a license — which has raised the question of whether Davison has one. We met him when he turned in his signatures — he was the second-to-last person to do so and encouraged us to read his recently published book, titled, “Make Rifles Great Again.”
Rachel Alexander, a former prosecutor who used to run with Andy Thomas until she got barred from practicing law so she became right-wing pundit, was so drunk when she was pulled over in Scottsdale that she kept asking the police officer to talk to “Sherry Jeridan.”
“I quickly realized she might be talking about the Maricopa County Sheriff Jerry Sheridan,” the officer who arrested her reported. “Rachel then asked me if he had ever talked to me about ‘us entering the jail.’”
Alexander was pulled over after attending a Dec. 21 party with Arizona Republicans, where she took a selfie with Senate President Warren Petersen, who is running for attorney general.
She was charged with extreme DUI, among other charges, and her case is making its way through Scottsdale City Court, Robert Anglen reports for the Republic.
But it’s not her fault. Getting arrested for driving with a blood alcohol level three times the legal limit is all “lawfare” from “the left and their agents,” she says.
“I always accept responsibility for my actions, and remember in the United States of America, no one is guilty until convicted in a court of law,” Alexander said in an email to the Republic that turned into a rambling screed against Democrats.