A number of the laws enacted by the 2004 General Assembly take effect July 1. An AP story today has a report. Some quotes:
INDIANAPOLIS (AP) -- Deadbeat state taxpayers, take note: Starting Thursday, thousands of your names may show up on the Internet. Under a new state law effective July 1, the Indiana Department of Revenue will post on its Web site the names of individuals and businesses who have not paid tax bills of $1,000 or more for at least two years and have warrants against them.More on the criminal history checks problem is in this AP story. Some quotes:The agency is calling the page INDEBT, and the threat alone of being listed already has paid off. Since the agency sent out warning letters about the law to thousands of delinquent taxpayers in mid-May, it has collected more than $900,000 in back taxes. * * *
Other new laws approved by lawmakers in the last General Assembly session take aim at the state's economy, public safety and crime. Ninety-eight bills became law, and most of those will take effect Thursday. * * *
One new law requires additional public disclosure of information about children who die as a result of abuse or neglect. Another law due to take effect, which would mandate criminal history checks on relatives before they take emergency placements of abused and neglected children, has been stymied by the Child Protection Services' failure to win swift access to a national criminal database. * * *
Residents will have another year to comply with a law that drew intense interest during its trek through the General Assembly. Starting July 1, 2005, the state will require children to ride in car seats or booster seats up to age 8.
INDIANAPOLIS — Days before a state law was to take effect, Indiana has been set back in efforts to run criminal background checks on relatives taking custody of abused or neglected children. The FBI has rejected the state's request for access to a national criminal database. The information was necessary if, under the law due to take effect Thursday, the state was going to be able to place children with relatives in a timely manner.[Update 6/30/04] A story today in the Star reports:The FBI's action prompted the Indiana Civil Liberties Union to seek a temporary injunction against the law Friday. Under the law, children removed from their biological parents' homes would not be placed with relatives until everyone in the children's new home received criminal background checks.
The Indiana Family and Social Services Administration acknowledged the ICLU's legal action restrained the ability of the agency and the courts to conduct background checks. * * *
The FBI told the state last week that Child Protection Services could not gain access criminal records in the Department of Justice database because it is not a criminal justice agency. * * *
The ICLU got involved Friday, filing a motion in Marion County's juvenile court seeking to overturn a state decision to place a child in foster care rather than with a relative.
ICLU legal director Ken Falk said the organization was seeking to have the eventual decision in the case decided on behalf of all Indiana children who might be placed in foster care instead of with suitable relatives. "What this law would do, in effect, is make it much easier to place a child with a stranger than with a relative," Falk said. The state performs only local background checks on foster parents, he said.
An FBI official said Tuesday that Indiana officials never sought the federal agency's advice on a new state law that requires caseworkers to perform FBI background checks on relatives who want to provide foster care to a child family member. Had that happened, the state law could have been crafted to be in agreement with federal law, said agent James H. Davis of the FBI's Indianapolis office.Posted by Marcia Oddi at June 27, 2004 02:00 PMAs the law is written, caseworkers won't have access to FBI criminal records when the law goes into effect Thursday, officials said. This means nationwide criminal records checks cannot be performed. * * *
Last month, Marion County juvenile court Judge James W. Payne criticized House Enrolled Act 1194, saying he never was asked for input on the proposal. Payne predicted that the type of national background checks called for by the law could result in children being delayed in licensed foster care for weeks or even months while the investigations took place. This would have jeopardized Indiana's federal foster care funding because of bans on multiple placements of children.