Senate Bill S5539

                                 BILL NUMBER:  S5539

 TITLE OF BILL :  An act to amend the social services law, in relation
to the duty to report incidents

 PURPOSE OR GENERAL IDEA OF BILL :

This legislation is meant to provide clarity and uniformity to all
appropriate state agencies on reporting requirements that have already
been adopted by the Office of Mental Health and by the Office of
Alcoholism and Substance Abuse Services as it relates to the Justice
Center.

 SUMMARY OF PROVISIONS :

Section one amends section 491 of the social services law to allow a
mandated reporter to refrain from filing an incident report when

(i) the reporter has actual knowledge that the reportable incident has
already been reported to the register; and

(ii) that the reporter has been named as a person with knowledge of
the incident in such prior report.

Section two establishes the effective date.

              

 JUSTIFICATION :

Employees from the six state oversight agencies under the jurisdiction
of the Empire Justice Center are mandated to report an incident if
directly observed, or when said employee receives notice from another
person that provides the mandated reporter with reasonable cause to
suspect that an individual was subjected to a reportable incident.
These reporting requirements have led to a higher rate of vigilance
and observance, but have also led to duplicity.

Currently, when an incident occurs in front of a group of mandated
reporters, each of those employees are statutorily required to file a
report. This multiple reporting requirement has been found to be
burdensome and has led to a slowdown of processing and/or prosecution.

This legislation would allow a mandated reporter to refrain from
filing a report only in cases where it has been confirmed to them that
an incident report was already filed, and in cases where said reporter
is listed as a witness in the incident report.

These changes to reporting requirements have already been adopted by
the Office of Mental Health and by the Office of Alcoholism and
Substance Abuse Services with the approval of the Justice Center.

 PRIOR LEGISLATIVE HISTORY :

New bill.

 FISCAL IMPLICATIONS :

None to the state.

 EFFECTIVE DATE :
This act shall take effect immediately.