The Office of Colorado’s Child Protection Ombudsman (CPO) published its 2021-22 Annual Report last week, detailing the independent agency’s case activity, legislative efforts, community engagement and program updates over the previous fiscal year.
Opening 982 cases in 2021-22, the CPO experienced a 15 percent year-over-year increase in its caseload. The record number of cases marks a 70 percent increase since the 2016-17 fiscal year. With more than 67 percent of questions and concerns coming from family members, the most common issues were related to behavioral health, specific child welfare practices, child custody, domestic violence and sexual abuse.
“This year – like every year – we focused heavily on providing Colorado citizens with strong customer service,” said Colorado’s Child Protection Ombudsman Stephanie Villafuerte. “Our goal is to make citizens feel heard, respected and to leave them more informed about their situation than before they contacted us.”
Outside of the CPO’s review of cases, the agency was instrumental in the creation of two new statewide task forces by the Colorado General Assembly. Housed under the new CPO Public Policy Advancement Center, the Mandatory Reporting Task Force will spend the next two years analyzing the effectiveness of and issues with the law requiring individuals from specific professions to report suspected child abuse to authorities, while the Timothy Montoya Task Force – named after a 12-year-old who was hit and killed by a car shortly after running away from his out-of-home placement – will study runaway behaviors to develop a consistent, prompt and effective response for youth who run away from foster care and residential child care facilities.
“To address these significant problems, the CPO worked with 90 different stakeholders,” Villafuerte said. “These task forces will center on the experience and voices of family and youth to ensure those who experience these systems have direct input on how these systems can work better.”
The CPO’s report additionally highlighted its efforts to engage and elevate youth voices, monitor the care of unaccompanied immigrant children residing in state-licensed facilities and launch an independent process for reviewing incidents of egregious abuse, near fatalities and child deaths caused by abuse and neglect.
For complete details and more information, please see the complete 2021-2022 Office of Colorado’s Child Protection Ombudsman Annual Report.
About the Office of Colorado’s Child Protection Ombudsman
The Office of Colorado’s Child Protection Ombudsman (CPO) is committed to ensuring the state’s child protection system consistently provides high-quality services to every child, family and community in Colorado. CPO was established in 2010 in response to the maltreatment deaths of 12 children in Colorado in 2007. It is independent from the state and county agencies that work on behalf of children and families. It listens to the public about their experience with and concerns about child protection, researches and investigates those concerns, and determines the best way to resolve each concern.
More information can be found at https://coloradocpo.org