Lawmakers clamp down on child abuse at early learning centers

BATON ROUGE — The Louisiana Senate Health and Welfare Committee advanced legislation this week aimed at closing gaps in child abuse investigations at early learning centers.

The bill moved forward following a heartbreaking testimony from a family whose three-year-old daughter was sexually assaulted by a classmate at an unlicensed private school.

Senate Bill 41, introduced by Sen. Regina Barrow, D-Baton Rouge, aims to clarify who holds responsibility for investigating child-on-child abuse in early education settings and strengthen oversight of unlicensed early learning centers.

They include some day care centers and pre-kindergarten programs that are not currently required to follow Louisiana Department of Education guidelines.

The proposal gained urgency after a powerful testimony from a Jefferson Parish family.

The father, a member of the Army National Guard, testified that he discovered blood in his daughter’s underwear after picking her up from school and helping her change into her leotard for gymnastics practice. His daughter later told him a classmate had touched her inappropriately.

“We immediately sought medical help at Children’s Hospital in New Orleans,” the father told the committee. “The weeks that followed, my mental health would be equivalent to, if not worse than, my combat deployment to Iraq.”

The family explained how the Jefferson Parish Sheriff’s Office initially refused to investigate, citing the children’s young age, and how the Department of Children and Family Services (DFCS) stated that the matter fell under law enforcement’s jurisdiction.

It was not until weeks later that a detective was assigned to the case.

“Everybody is pointing fingers at each other,” the mother proclaimed.

She explained that no agency would take responsibility for the case. That led her to pull her child out of school and have her father-in-law travel down from New York to help care for the children.

Under current law, public schools are required to conduct criminal background checks on employees but are not mandated to consult DCFS’s child abuse registry.

“We need to get this gap closed,” Sen. Barrow said. “There is no reason this school shouldn’t be treated like any other school.”

SB41 would require all schools, public and private, to conduct both criminal history checks and consult the child abuse registry before hiring staff. It also aims to define which agency must respond when incidents like the one experienced by the Jefferson Parish family occur.

State child ombudsman Kathleen Ritchie testified that such incidents often stem from a history of trauma and said both alleged perpetrators and victims must be assessed and connected to services.

“We’ve failed this child, and we need to fix this problem,” said Sen. Jay Luneau. “We’ve got to do better.”

The bill also includes amendments that limit registry background checks to school employees hired after August 1, 2018, and exempt certified teachers from duplicate checks already completed by schools.

The bill received strong support from the committee and heads to the Senate floor.

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