It is, in my review and opinion, not for the benefit of the child or the parent.
Rep. Elizabeth Scott submitted a number of amendments which would have switched the bill to benefit the child, parents and grandparents but the chair of the House committee, Rep. Kagi objected to them. We appreciate Rep. Scott for her integrity and courage to take right action that is in line with the Washington State Constitution, the existing child day care licensing laws and Public Records Act.
By Margo Logan
National Expert
Witness/Analyst Regarding Child Day Care
Please enter my
Testimony as follows into the March
16, 2015 Human Services, Mental Health & Housing Senate
Committee Hearing
What Lies Beneath
the Real Intent of HB 1126 Child Death Review Bill?
On behalf of parents whose children died as well as the
little ones themselves who died in licensed child day care I submit my written
testimony to the senators of the Washington State legislature’s March 16, 2015 Human
Services, Mental Health and Housing committee hearing.
I request the Senate kill HB1126 bill as they did in 2014 OR upon acceptance of ALL of Rep. Elizabeth Scott’s
amendments (those withdrawn, failed and passed) revise and pass what is now
called substitute ELHS 15 since it left the House.
No law EVER was required in order for DEL
to perform their duty under law to audit, review, investigate, inspect,
interview, analyze, get feedback, get testimony, review the performance of the agency; review RCW &
WAC, reach out to outside experts to answer the question, “How come this child
died in a day care we licensed?”
Under RCW 42.52.010 the definition of “public officer”
includes (Bolding is mine): “(19) "State officer" means every person holding a position of public
trust in or under an executive, legislative, or judicial office of the state.
"State officer" includes judges of the superior court, judges of the
court of appeals, justices of the supreme court, members of the legislature together with the secretary of the
senate and the chief clerk of the house of representatives, holders of elective
offices in the executive branch of state government, chief executive officers of state agencies, members of boards,
commissions, or committees with authority over one or more state agencies or
institutions, and employees of the state
who are engaged in supervisory, policy-making, or policy-enforcing work.
For the purposes of this chapter, "state officer" also includes any
person exercising or undertaking to exercise the powers or functions of a state
officer.”
The Department of Early Learning is under the Governor’s
Office. Director Bette Hyde reports directly to Governor Jay Inslee.
There is a law that the management of the agency must be
evaluated for performance based on efficiency, effectiveness and economy. A child’s death calls for an immediate and
emergency evaluation of the agency’s performance to prevent the next deaths
from occurring.
“42.20.100 - Failure of duty by public officer a misdemeanor.”
“Whenever any duty is enjoined by law upon any public officer or other person holding
any public trust or employment,
their wilful neglect to perform such
duty, except where otherwise specially provided for, shall be a
misdemeanor.”
No law has ever been required since the inception of day
care licensing in the state of Washington
that denied a child protection and child abuse prevention agency to not investigate
to answer the question, “How come this baby died in a day care we licensed?”
A violation of law needing to be addressed is why the
director of DEL, Bette Hyde, a
public officer, did not do so in 2013? Or did she? Kyle Smith of DSHS child death
reviews told me over the phone one was done on Eve’s death. Then shortly after our phone conversation, I
got an email that said one was not done by DSHS; that since 2011 DSHS has done
no day care death reviews because the law had changed.
However I found a child death review done by DSHS on a day
care in 2011, one that had no recommendations for DEL even though DSHS had
clear evidence in the record of poor sleep practices having been observed at
that day care by DEL where later a baby died.
I have made repeated requests for the child death review
done on Eve’s death including my most recent one a few days ago. Last night I received an email from director
Bette Hyde forwarding my request onto her public disclosure coordinator which
tells me a death review had been done regarding Eve Uphold otherwise her email
would have just advised me no death review existed. Why is the director of DEL
hiding Eve’s death review? And if no review, why not? Director Hyde did not
show up in 2014 nor in 2015 to testify about this bill.
In a separate request I received recently in the mail, it
includes an email from DSHS administrator Nancy Heath dated January 14, 2015 to Paul Smith (who
heads up the DSHS child death reviews that occurred in day care) for him to
track HB 1126. In it she writes “I
think HB 1126 is identical to HB 2165 from last year but didn’t do a line by
line comparison. It is not request legislation from DEL. Maybe Kagi thought it
was such a good idea she decided to run it again.”
Thus DEL never asked for this legislation even though DEL
administrator Amy Blondin testified last year to the senate committee DEL
wanted this bill to “…essentially make sure we’re not building a
case against ourselves…” DSHS in
2015 still does death reviews on day care children.
Rep. Kagi said no law allowed DEL
to investigate or review deaths in child day care thus she dropped this
bill. Rep. Kagi stated at the 2015 public
hearing regarding that there had been no opposition to this bill last year in
2014. There was significant opposition
last year including from three parents whose babies had died in licensed family
home child day care in Washington State.
Rep. Kagi made a false statement:
RCW 42.20.040: “Every
public officer who shall knowingly make any false or misleading statement in
any official report or statement, under circumstances not otherwise prohibited
by law, shall be guilty of a gross misdemeanor.”
DSHS has been doing those death reviews since at least the
early 1990s and in 2001 when Graham died in the same day care where Eve died in
2013 DSHS did that death review then visited the day care licensing offices to
share that review and left them photographs of the death scene. Day care licensing did not do their
investigation of violations of licensing laws nor was enforcement action taken.
Then recently I was told by DSHS that DSHS changed the law
in 2011 so as to not have to review day care deaths of children.
However, I just received public records in the mail, Friday, March 13, 2015 which shows no
intent by DSHS in 2011 to drop child day care death reviews; the change in 2011
was to be able to get autopsy reports because some DSHS office’s reportedly were
having trouble getting them.
Getting autopsy reports is easy to do; all DSHS had to do in
conducting their reviews of a child’s death would have been to ask the family
for their copy. The parents of the dead
children have the right to a copy of the autopsy. Why wasn’t DSHS doing that?
Nevertheless in the documents released to me is there not one
iota of evidence in the public record that DSHS wanted the bill in 2011 to stop
reviewing the deaths of children in licensed day care. DSHS just wanted autopsy reports.
What the heck happened in my great state of Washington?
Why are we the people getting buried under an avalanche of
laws, of RCWs then a plethora of subsections of RCWs around ostensibly the
protection of the children, the prevention of maltreatment of children, the
health, safety and well-being of children being “paramount” under the care of
DSHS and/or DEL day care licensing
within the state of Washington?
In the 2011 revision to the law regarding child death
reviews DSHS conducts the “Bill Analysis” information is germane and exposes the
real intent of these laws (including OFCO):
- “Fatality and near fatality reviews cannot be entered as evidence or used in civil and administrative hearings.”
- “Documents created for the near fatality and fatality reviews or created by the review teams are not admissible in civil and administrative hearings.”
- “Fatality review team members, including department employees, may not be examined in civil or administrative hearings regarding their participation in the near fatality and fatality reviews.”
- “SHB 1105 clarifies that the fatality review report, rather than the review, is subject to public disclosure.”
- “SHB 1105 adds information from autopsy and post mortem reports are confidential and may be redacted by the department from the child fatality review report.”
I parsed through the 2015 “Engrossed Substitute House Bill
1126” as a public hearing is scheduled for March 16, 2015 in the senate. What do I find? Is the bill written for we
the people to understand? Is it written
for clarity and easy understanding by parents and grandparents? Is it written to reduce deaths in day care in
the future?
Upon review and analysis of copies of the documents I now
have, my opinion as a national expert witness/analyst regarding licensed child
day care is no.
The bill is four pages long contained within 136 numbered
lines. Only 23 lines are devoted to how a child death review is to be
conducted. The other 113 lines relate directly or indirectly as to how information
gathered through documents and interviews will be kept from we the people, from
parents, from grandparents whether through a public disclosure request, a civil
action or an administrative hearing unless of course DEL wants to use the
material themselves in an administrative hearing. Then DEL
can use any of it.
Within the bill 76 subsections of laws are cited without
clarifying information as to what is within those 76 subsections of laws. How
is the citizen of Washington State
to read this bill without commencing a “Find Waldo” effort to parse through
this bill to figure out its real intent?
As an expert and as having been an investigator for twenty
years plus inside DSHS with thirteen years inside day care licensing as an
investigator then eight years as a national investigator/expert witness/analyst
I found Waldo.
The intent of the law in my expert opinion is to protect
unelected government managers from accountability and liability in their
failure of duty to protect children in licensed child day care in the State of Washington.
This perversion, this distortion against protecting the
health of the public, this perversion, this distortion of the role of
government in protecting babies and children goes back to when either OFCO or
DSHS first came up with the idea of covering up government mistakes around the
deaths of children by burying public records in their files that the common
citizen cannot see, that the civil courts cannot see, that administrative
hearing courts cannot see, that judges cannot see.
It boggles the mind that we have a system wherein judges
themselves are denied the rightful, responsible and judicial action to review
and have oversight of the workings of the unelected state government
bureaucracy.
It further boggles the mind because our state constitution
gives us, we the people oversight over this government thus the reason we have such
a strong public records disclosure law; and that we hold our unelected
government liable when the unelected public servants subvert and violate our
laws.
This bill which is patterned after OFCO and DSHS machinations
sublimates and undermines the intent of our constitution that it is we, the
people who have this constitutional right of oversight. This bill as DEL
administrator Amy Blondin testified in 2014 to the senate it is a cover up bill
to “…essentially
make sure we’re not building a case against ourselves….”
That cover up was all ready there through the DSHS review
process except a 2010 DSHS death review DSHS criticized DEL for their lack of
confidence in conducting investigations as well as DEL’s lack of training DEL
staff on safe sleep practices when Rep. Kagi floated out this bill last year
after little Eve died.
As DSHS administrator Nancy Heath wrote DEL
did not make this request for legislation so why did Rep. Kagi write and
sponsor this bill?
From my review this is my analysis and opinion on what
played out. Little tiny four months old baby Eve died in Rep. Kagi’s
district. Eve’s mommy and daddy filed a
lawsuit and thus it got discovered that little tiny six months old Graham
Hazzard died in the same day care in 2001; in Ruth Kagi’s district. The media
got hold of the story and contacted Rep. Ruth Kagi.
The parents want justice, remediation; some action that
another baby won’t die in a similar way so that their baby’s death wasn’t in
vain so Graham’s death in the same day care was not in vain. Instead of
remediation and redemption Ruth Kagi came up with this bill and named it the
Eve Uphold bill.
DSHS didn’t want this bill. OFCO didn’t want this bill. DEL didn’t want this bill. Ruth Kagi wanted this bill.
My review and analysis, my expert opinion from the documents
sent to me so far by the government is Rep. Kagi was backed into a corner by
the parents (unknowingly, acting in good faith with trust that their
representative was there to help them), by the legal system, by the media and
this is what Rep. Kagi chose to do in an attempt to make herself look good.
Rep. Kagi wasn’t even protecting DEL. DEL didn’t ask for this bill. Rep. Kagi was protecting herself.
Rep. Elizabeth Scott introduced amendments to this bill, HB
1126, (which Rep. Kagi objected to) to tweak the bill in what would have
resulted in justice and meaning behind Eve and Graham’s short lives on this
planet and would have had the “EFFECT” of:
- “Removes the limitations on introducing information collected during child fatality reviews in civil or administrative proceedings.”
- “Requires the Department of Early Learning to terminate a department employee responsible for licensing child care centers and homes or early learning programs if that employee is found to have failed to fulfill their duties and a child fatality occurs as a result of that failure.”
- “Requires the Department of Early Learning to revoke a license if a child care provider is found to have violated applicable laws or rules and a child fatality occurs as a result of this violation.”
- “Requires the child fatality review to be open to the public and subject to the Public Records Act and the Open Public Meetings Act.”
- “Adds an additional purpose of the fatality review to ensure the Department of Early Learning is held accountable for child safety violations.”
These amendments did not go forward in the full House
passing the bill on March 4, 2015 with 86 voting yes and eleven voting no.
In summary I request the Senate kill HB1126 bill as they did
in 2014 OR upon acceptance of ALL of Rep. Elizabeth Scott’s amendments (those
withdrawn, failed and passed) revise and pass what is now called substitute
ELHS 15 since it left the House.
The bill revised per Rep. Scott’s amendments would reflect
the Washington State Constitution and the will of we the people to get public
records; and to have oversight over our unelected government public officers
and government servants in Washington
State.
Thank you for your time and consideration in reviewing this
information, my analysis and expert opinion.
Please enter my testimony into the 2015 Washington State Legislative
record.
Margo Logan, MSW
Child Care Consulting, L.L.C.
PS: See attachment for supporting documents.
