HSB 625

This bill relates to processes overseen by the department of health and human services (HHS), including internal adoption information sharing, dependent adult abuse matters, juvenile justice court filings, and mandatory reporter training. DIVISION I —— INTERNAL ADOPTION INFORMATION SHARING. This division of the bill allows HHS to share information relating to a child’s adoption records within HHS for the purposes of ensuring continuity of services administered by HHS. DIVISION II —— DEPENDENT ADULT ABUSE. This division of the bill relates to dependent adult abuse. The bill includes breach of a fiduciary duty owed to a dependent adult as a form of dependent adult abuse. The bill allows a court, upon HHS showing probable cause that a dependent adult has been financially exploited, including the identification of financial records HHS reasonably believes were financially exploited, to authorize a person recommended by HHS to make an evaluation and to gain access to the dependent adult’s financial records. The bill allows a tribal court, a tribal prosecutor, or tribal services to access founded and unfounded dependent adult abuse information. DIVISION III —— ACCESS TO JUVENILE JUSTICE COURT FILINGS. This division of the bill allows HHS to have access to all juvenile court social records filed in the electronic document management system or in paper format. DIVISION IV —— MANDATORY REPORTER TRAINING. _____ of the bill relates to mandatory reporter training. Certain classes of persons are statutorily required to make reports to HHS regarding cases of child abuse. These persons, other than a physician whose professional practice does not regularly involve providing primary health care to children, are required to receive training related to the identification and reporting of child abuse. The trainings are currently two hours for initial training and one hour recertification trainings which need to be completed once every three years. The bill removes the time requirement for the initial trainings and eliminates the recertification trainings. The bill contains similar language for dependent adult abuse mandatory reporter training.