Countless children are in the web of government sponsored, supervised and supported placement programs. Some have been abandoned or taken from their homes, and it’s important that they be protected in the stages of their journey.

That’s one reason why the state senate passed a package of legislation to ensure the welfare and well-being of children by making improvements to child protection services and increasing penalties for crimes committed against children.

• Records check of placement guardians – Requires a national criminal record, child abuse and maltreatment check of all persons with whom children are placed, and non-parents seeking guardianship of, or visitation with, children (S.5394-A);

• Accelerating permanent placement – Ensures that children caught in limbo of foster care are given a permanent home, either by returning them to their families or through adoption or other alternatives, as quickly as possible with the “one judge, one family” concept (S.7888);

• Protection services demonstration project – Establishes two levels of child protection services – one to provide a service-based approach to minor cases and one for full-fledged investigations of abuse and neglect in order to eliminate adversarial relations between case workers and families (S.6535);

The senate also passed several bills pertaining to crimes against children that would:

• Assure that when an individual is convicted of a crime against a child including abandonment, non-support, endangering the welfare of a child and sexual performance by a child, the district attorney notifies the local child protective services agency (S.1626-A);