Nevada lawmaker wants more protections for parents who give up an infant child
CARSON CITY — Parents who surrender their infants to emergency service providers through the Safe Haven Law would have more safeguards to protect their confidentiality under a bill in the Nevada Legislature.
Senate Bill 2 states that any emergency services provider, including the hospital where the child was born, cannot provide identifying information to a child welfare agency about the parent who surrendered the child.
The bill is sponsored by state Sen. Mark Manendo, D-Las Vegas, and was heard in the Senate Committee on Health and Human Services on Monday.
It is intended to “uphold the original intent of the law,” which allows parents unable to care for an infant a “safe, anonymous option for the surrender of their infant,” Manendo said.
Officials from Clark County and Washoe County spoke in support of the bill.
“There are circumstances where a provider of emergency services may have that identifying information” prior to a parent invoking Safe Haven, Brigid Duffy, director of the juvenile division for the Clark County District Attorney’s Office, told the committee.
Passed in 2001, the Safe Haven Law allows parents to legally give up their infants younger than 30 days old to an emergency services provider.
The bill would change the law so that a child welfare agency no longer has to provide notice of the child’s custody hearings to the parent who gave up the child.
The non-delivering parent would still get a notice, but officials say the other parent’s identify often is unavailable. The law allows one parent to surrender the infant.
An exception to the anonymity exists is if the infant shows signs of abuse and neglect.
Contact Ben Botkin at bbotkin@reviewjournal.com or 775-461-0661. Follow @BenBotkin1 on Twitter.
