                                 CODE OF VIRGINIA

ESTABLISHMENT OF CHILD-PROTECTIVE SERVICES UNIT; DUTIES (§ 63.2-1502)

There is created a Child-Protective Services Unit in the Department that shall
have the following powers and duties:

1. To evaluate and strengthen all local, regional and state programs dealing
with child abuse and neglect.

2. To assume primary responsibility for directing the planning and funding of
child-protective services. This shall include reviewing and approving the annual
proposed plans and budgets for protective services submitted by the local
departments.

3. To assist in developing programs aimed at discovering and preventing the many
factors causing child abuse and neglect.

4. To prepare and disseminate, including the presentation of, educational
programs and materials on child abuse and neglect.

5. To provide educational programs for professionals required by law to make
reports under this chapter.

6. To establish standards of training and provide educational programs to
qualify workers in the field of child-protective services. Such standards of
training shall include provisions regarding the legal duties of the workers in
order to protect the constitutional and statutory rights and safety of children
and families from the initial time of contact during investigation through
treatment.

7. To establish standards of training and educational programs to qualify
workers to determine whether complaints of abuse or neglect of a child in a
private or state-operated hospital, institution or other facility, or public
school, are founded.

8. To maintain staff qualified pursuant to Board regulations to assist local
department personnel in determining whether an employee of a private or
state-operated hospital, institution or other facility or an employee of a
school board, abused or neglected a child in such hospital, institution, or
other facility, or public school.

9. To monitor the processing and determination of cases where an employee of a
private or state-operated hospital, institution or other facility, or an
employee of a school board, is suspected of abusing or neglecting a child in
such hospital, institution, or other facility, or public school.

10. To help coordinate child-protective services at the state, regional, and
local levels with the efforts of other state and voluntary social, medical and
legal agencies.

11. To maintain a child abuse and neglect information system that includes all
cases of child abuse and neglect within the Commonwealth.

12. To provide for methods to preserve the confidentiality of all records in
order to protect the rights of the child, and his parents or guardians.

13. To establish minimum training requirements for workers and supervisors on
family abuse and domestic violence, including the relationship between domestic
violence and child abuse and neglect.

14. To establish minimum training requirements for workers and supervisors on
identifying, assessing, and providing comprehensive services for children who
are victims of sex trafficking or severe forms of trafficking as defined in the
Trafficking Victims Protection Act of 2000, 22 U.S.C &#xA7; 7102 et seq., and in
the Justice for Victims of Trafficking Act of 2015, 42 U.S.C. &#xA7; 5101 et
seq., including efforts to coordinate with law-enforcement, juvenile justice,
and social service agencies such as runaway and homeless youth shelters to serve
this population.

HISTORY: 1975, c. 341, § 63.1-248.7; 1984, c. 734; 1993, c. 955; 2000, c. 500;
2002, c. 747; 2004, cc. 93, 233, 972, 980; 2016, c. 631.