When good intentions go wrong
Earlier this year, the lifeless body of a newborn baby girl was found along the shallow shoreline of the Mississippi River, just south of Minneapolis. The abandoned child had no visible injuries and had been carried to term. What made the tragedy particularly heartbreaking was that the baby had been carefully wrapped in a blanket with a rosary tucked into the folds. A ceramic angel was draped over the infant. To date, neither the baby’s identity nor any other leads on the abandonment have been uncovered.
Despite the senseless loss, whoever left the child had an emotional bond. There was an outpouring of grief, sympathy and sadness from the community. Many individuals donated money to pay for a proper internment.
It is ironic that she was treated better in death than in life. Why wasn’t she relinquished to a hospital under Minnesota’s “Safe Place for Newborns” law? Were the parents not aware of the statute that allowed a baby to be given up without question at any hospital?
Anecdotally, I was told that this type of abandonment happens several times a year. However, there is no way of knowing whether additional incidents like this occur that are never discovered.
Many states, including Minnesota, have laws that allow for a parent to relinquish a newborn with no questions asked. State lawmakers, who were compelled to put life ahead of any other legal considerations, assumed a philosophy that the wellbeing of the child took precedent over obtaining information. Despite this state’s “no questions asked” policy, it failed this little girl.
Governor Mark Dayton directed the Minnesota Department of Human Services to expand the “Safe Place” law. As part of a larger child welfare initiative, language was drafted that allow the definition of “newborn” to be expanded from a child no more than 72 hours old, to seven days of age.
Further, the number of sites where a mother, or their designee, could relinquish an unharmed baby without legal implications, was greatly expanded. The previous law identified licensed hospitals as the only “safe place” option. This year’s proposal originally included additional “safe places,” such as law enforcement centers, ambulance stations, fire departments, urgent care centers and county emergency managers. The reaction from just about all of the aforementioned entities was quick and overwhelmingly negative.
For some reason, most of them looked to my lobbying partner, Buck McAlpin, and me to intercede and try to “fix” the bill. It wasn’t on our client’s list of issues in which to become involved, but agreeing to take the lead was preferable to seeing a bill pass that simply wouldn’t work.
As a result of our high profile with the issue and the fact that we felt the measure was poorly drafted, we were quickly pegged as “not caring about abandoned newborns.” One of Gov. Dayton’s assistants even asked why we didn’t care about abandoned babies. He followed by asking us to work with human services and come up with some wording. We explained that the language that was introduced simply wouldn’t work, for the following reasons:
- Many of the original locations are not staffed at all times. A mother already under considerable distress is simply not going to go from site to site to find a place to give up her baby;
- Emergency managers may not have any healthcare training; and
- Law enforcement’s job is to ask questions. Despite the law, it is counterintuitive to expect someone to simply approach a police officer, hand them a baby and walk away.
Our explanation resonated. We proposed a new system where EMS took the lead. Within several days, Buck and I were no longer bums. Rather, we were elevated to the status of heroes of the newborns. We started drafting language and sought to educate the bureaucrats. After a number of frustrating negotiating sessions with the state, Jim Abeler, chair of the House Health & Human Services Finance Committee, stepped in and helped us broker a deal.
Ambulance providers are pivotal in the new law, which takes effect on August 1. A mother or her designee may simply call 9-1-1 and tell the dispatcher that they have a newborn to be relinquished. Ambulance services will pick up the infant, assess his or her condition and transport them to the nearest hospital, no questions asked.
Our involvement has had a number of benefits. First, it was the right thing to do. Second, we established positive new relationships with legislators and various child-advocate organizations with which we had not worked with previously. We also returned the favor to Gov. Dayton, who signed our Community Paramedic Law this past year despite considerable pressure from some influential organizations to veto it.
The next step is to get the word out. The Minnesota Ambulance Association will be partnering with the state and a number of child welfare organizations on public service announcements to publicize the new program.
