"Sunshine" Legislation is Needed in All Fifty States

"Sunshine" is a legislative campaign designed to advance child protection in this country, yet this piece of legislation is missing from the books in all 50 states. This one piece of legislation will provide parents with much needed transparency and accountability, allowing parents to know exactly how their elected public servants are doing when it comes to protecting this nation's children.

I can totally understand the concept of "Sunshine". As a homemaker, I have noticed on many occasions as I clean, that once the sun comes out it tends to expose dust particles left behind and streaks on my otherwise clean windows. Sunshine helps us to see clearly, which is the focus and purpose of the Sunshine Law.

The PROTECT organization provides us with the highlights of this bill:
It requires information to be collected and reported at the local level on a public website. It also records how many reports are made of child abuse and neglect (by county) and how many children are screened in or out (by county). It also shows how many reports of abuse/neglect are investigated, then ruled either founded or unfounded. Then it will ask how many founded cases are overruled on administrative appeal, how many cases enter family court, and how often the courts rule against the State's child protection petition. It will also report how often children receive the appointment of either an attorney or an advocate and how often appeals are filed by the child's attorney, advocate or the state.

In the state of Virginia, the bill has been so altered that it is no longer recognizable. Resistance to the passage of this bill has already caused lawmakers to remove police officers, prosecutors and judges, requiring no accountability from them. Family court officials also want out, opting to leave only the Virginia Department of Social Services with the burden of transparency and accountability. The final death blow to this bill in the state of Virginia came when someone removed the requirement of using a public website as a means of informing the citizens of that state as to how their public servants handle the matter of protecting their children. So much for accountability.

If you are interested in helping to promote transparency and accountability in your elected officials, please contact your state senators and representatives and ask them to bring some "Sunshine" into your state by supporting Senate Bill 1068 and House Bill 1904. Children who have been abused and/or neglected have already suffered enough. We should all be careful as to how these children are handled within the courts and our judicial system.

When children get lost in the vast tangle of red tape within our court system, something is very wrong. It is time for us all to join the PROTECT grass roots movement which calls for accountability in the righting of these wrongs.

Source:

http://www.protect.org/
http://leg1.state.va.us/cgi-bin/legp504.exe?091+sum+HB1904