How is North Carolina ensuring the safety of child welfare workers who may encounter meth labs?
Our state child welfare manual, which the counties are required to use, speaks specifically to meth use and responding in child protective service cases and other situations where meth use is [suspected]. If a county department of social services receives a report of a laboratory and that children are involved, the social worker does not respond without law enforcement. How have communities and agencies collaborated to address meth abuse and its effects on child welfare? When we decided as a state that we were experiencing a crisis and we needed to work together, more than 20 agencies were represented at various times on the many work groups and task forces and committees–the Divisions of Mental Health, Public Health, and Social Services; all branches of our law enforcement; the attorney general’s office; juvenile justice–just about everybody in state government was at the table to say, “This is going to impact us.” As a result of the work we did, we have better guidelines and stiffe
