Colorado Mandated Reporter Task Force Issues Interim Report

Colorado in 2022 commissioned a task force to review the state’s mandated reporter law and recommend any needed changes. The task force has issued an interim report after a year of hearings and research, outlining its findings to date and its planned next steps. According to the report, several themes emerged from a series of expert presentations and public hearings:

1. Colorado’s mandated reporting system disproportionately impacts families of color, people with disabilities and under-resourced communities.
2. The current definition of abuse and neglect is too broad and conflates factors such as poverty with child abuse.
3. Mandatory reporters who wish to connect families with resources such as financial assistance or food stamps are forced to report to the child abuse hotline.
4. Reports that do involve child safety may not get adequate attention because the number of reports is overwhelming the system.
5. The mandated reporter law causes families to avoid physicians, educators, and other professionals who could provide help because the parents fear being reported to the hotline.

The task force plans to spend its next year determining what changes the law and reporting system need.  As a first step, however, “the Task Force has agreed that it must first address Colorado’s current definition of child abuse and neglect. . . . Without first addressing the [overbroad definition], the Task Force cannot meaningfully recommend changes to the current mandated reporting system or law.” The Task Force will conduct meetings in January and February and develop new definitions to recommend.

Child welfare professionals need to keep an eye on the proceedings of this task force. It is part of a trend to seriously examine mandated reporting systems to determine if they actually keep children safer. Other states are certain to have the same concerns, and the proceedings of this task force may provide both a template for how to conduct the review and which factors to examine.

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