Parents Shouldn't Live in Fear of Child Protective Services

Lenore Skenazy
Thu, 09 Oct 2025 16:08:58 -0700
Opinion

"Let me tell you about Alice," said Mariel Mussack, an attorney with Community Legal Services, testifying in the Pennsylvania state Legislature on Monday. Alice, Mussack said, is a single mom of two who was also caretaker for her younger brother, aged 13. When she needed to run a brief errand, Alice had her brother babysit her nearly 1-year-old son.

For this, she was placed on the state's child abuse registry. It became almost impossible for Alice to find work as a home health aide.

Mussack was testifying in front of the Pennsylvania House Children and Youth Committee in favor of HB1873, the so-called Reasonable Childhood Independence bill that Let Grow has helped pass in 11 states to date. It clarifies that neglect is when you put your child in obvious, serious danger — not anytime you take your eyes off them.
Updated: Thu Oct 09, 2025

"Let me tell you about Alice," said Mariel Mussack, an attorney with Community Legal Services, testifying in the Pennsylvania state Legislature on Monday. Alice, Mussack said, is a single mom of two who was also caretaker for her younger brother, aged 13. When she needed to run a brief errand, Alice had her brother babysit her nearly 1-year-old son.

For this, she was placed on the state's child abuse registry. It became almost impossible for Alice to find work as a home health aide.

Mussack was testifying in front of the Pennsylvania House Children and Youth Committee in favor of HB1873, the so-called Reasonable Childhood Independence bill that Let Grow has helped pass in 11 states to date. It clarifies that neglect is when you put your child in obvious, serious danger — not anytime you take your eyes off them.

In Pennsylvania, as in most of the other states, the bill has bipartisan sponsors: State Reps. Jeanne McNeill and Rick Krajewski, who are Democrats, and state Rep. David Zimmerman, a Republican. Krajewski opened the hearing by noting that he'd grown up with a single mom who worked two or three jobs, which meant he got himself to school and helped care for his younger sister. "It really does chill me to think that, in the eyes of our state statutes, that could be seen as neglect," he said.

Zimmerman echoed his sentiments. He grew up on a farm, where he and his friends would play at the creek, build forts, feed the animals. "We'd be gone all day," he said. "And we really would look out for each other."

Peter Gray, a research professor of developmental psychology at Boston College and a cofounder with me of Let Grow, testified that that is exactly the kind of connection, autonomy and meaning that helps inoculate kids against despair.

But as constant adult supervision becomes the norm, more and more kids are being reported to the authorities. Diane Redleaf, a civil rights attorney and Let Grow's legal consultant, gave the stats: 37% of American children will be the subject of a hotline call. For African American children, that number soars to 53%.

For Ethan Demme, an adoptive dad in Lancaster, Pennsylvania, and CEO of the educational publishing company Demme Learning, the issue is also about trauma. Demme came to testify because he said knows "firsthand about parents abusing their children and the need to intervene when that happens." Unfortunately, he continued, "some people equate independence with neglect." All it takes is some passerby calling the authorities because his kids are outside, "and my children are thrust into another terrifying interaction with police or child services."

I got to testify too, reminding the committee of the Georgia mom handcuffed in front of her kids because her son, 10, walked to town unsupervised. And I read aloud a letter from Lonna Gordon, a suburban Philly mom whose sons — 9, 6 and 4 — had indeed had the cops called on them because they were playing outside nearby.

The cops decided the case did not warrant further intervention, wrote Gordon. "It may have helped that my 6-year-old insisted on giving them a play-by-play of a Pokemon battle at great length."

As for Alice, the pseudonym Mussack used for her client, the authorities kept questioning "whether leaving a 1-year-old with a 13-year-old could ever be considered reasonable," Mussack testified. "I found this sentiment surprising, even on a personal level — I often babysat younger cousins in my early teen years."

In the end, Alice got removed from the registry. But "we have seen many cases similar to Alice's," Mussack said.

As Demme summed it up: HB1873 doesn't lower the bar for protecting kids in real danger. But, he said, "We need to raise the bar for common sense."

Amen! The committee will vote on the bill in the coming days.