House committee debates parental-consent limits for DHR investigations; substitute sent to chair

At a House committee meeting, members discussed a substitute bill that would clarify parents’ rights to withhold consent for Department of Human Resources (DHR) investigators to enter homes and interview children during alleged abuse or neglect investigations. Lawmakers and staff concentrated on language that separates the authority to enter a home from the authority to interview a child, and on exceptions when investigators may proceed without parental consent.

The matter matters because the bill would codify limits on DHR’s investigatory access and define circumstances when investigators may interview children without parental permission—affecting child-welfare practice, parental due-process protections and DHR operational procedures statewide.

Representative Pasco, who said he drafted the substitute and incorporated two amendments he sponsored, told the committee he was proceeding “in…