Denver’s child welfare workers have seen a 55 percent increase in referrals from Denver schools following a “report-everything” recommendation from prosecutors and the recent prosecution of a principal, city officials said Wednesday.
Police Chief Gerry Whitman along with school and city officials said they are trying to develop new referral guidelines in response to the rising caseloads.
The guidelines would give examples of when school officials should and shouldn’t call police or social service workers to report potential crimes or potential sexual assaults.
“I appreciate your hearing this issue because we are facing a crisis in terms of an increase in reporting,” said Roxane White, the manager of the Denver Department Human Services, during the meeting with city council members to discuss the matter.
White urged a more flexible attitude.
Referrals from Denver schools to the DHS child abuse hotline jumped from 162 in January to 251 in February, amounting to a 55 percent increase, White said.
The increase also is using resources, with school referrals accounting for 27 percent of all referrals to DHS last month from 14 percent in typical months previously.
The surge in reporting follows the prosecution of Nicole Veltze, who has been temporarily reassigned from her job as principal of Skinner Middle School.
Veltze is scheduled on Tuesday to attend a plea hearing and scheduling matter in Denver County Court on misdemeanor charges of failure to report a crime at her school. Her lawyer has said Veltze had been investigating a sexual-harassment claim that one 13-year-old made against another 13-year-old.
Authorities say Veltze violated the law by failing to call police about the incident in a timely manner.
In addition, prosecutors urged in January that teachers and principals should aggressively report incidents, said Bob Anderson, who reviews expulsion and suspension hearings for the Denver Public Schools.
Anderson recalled that Lamar Sims, a chief deputy in Denver District Attorney Mitch Morrissey’s office, recommended during a seminar on Feb. 4 that school officials should take a “report-everything approach.”
Anderson said there’s worry among school administrators that if they fail to report, even the slightest of incidents, they could risk losing their license to teach or work as supervisors in schools.
Morrissey declined to attend Wednesday’s meeting on the issue because the Veltze case is still pending and he didn’t want to jeopardize it, said Morrissey’s spokeswoman, Lynn Kimbrough.
Kimbrough added that Morrissey believes it is up to lawyers for the Denver police and the Denver Department of Human Services to advise their agencies on what the legal responsibilities are, and that prosecutors should not be giving out hypothetical examples of what could or could not lead to prosecution.
Councilwoman Jeanne Faatz noted that the law requires prosecution only when there’s a “willful violation” of a failure to report sex assaults. She said she believed that terminology should give school officials some discretion in how they handle the cases.
Christopher N. Osher: 303-954-1747 or cosher@denverpost.com
