Child Protective Services

Gov. Greg Abbott signed four child welfare bills into law on Wednesday, measures that aim to recalibrate how the Texas Department of Family and Protective Services works with endangered children across the state. 

The Texas House on Thursday passed the last bill in a package of sweeping measures aimed at addressing a crisis in the state's child welfare system. 

As Texas Department of Family and Protective Services officials continue investigating the death of a girl who escaped a Child Protective Services office, advocates and legislators are grappling with the worst-case scenario of the state's shortage of homes for abused and neglected children.

A board of lawmakers has given final approval for $150 million in funding to help pull the Texas Department of Family and Protective Services out of its crisis mode — but there are strings attached. 

Texas lawmakers said Thursday they're willing to give $150 million in emergency funding to the embattled Department of Family and Protective Services to help the agency begin addressing gaps in its ability to protect vulnerable and abused children.

On the first day lawmakers could file bills for consideration during the 2017 session, leaders from both parties began drawing battle lines for fights over taxation, immigration and social issues that will likely dominate the upcoming meeting of the Texas Legislature. 

On any given day in the past six months, nearly a thousand of Texas' "highest-priority" children — considered by the state to be at immediate risk of physical or sexual abuse — were not checked on even once by Child Protective Services investigators.

Daniel Hernandez, an investigator for the state’s Child Protective Services agency, left his South Austin home at dawn on a recent Thursday holding a stack of folders.

The teenage pregnancy rate in the United States, including Texas, continues to fall, according to a recent report from the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

A federal judge ruled Thursday that Texas has violated foster children's constitutional rights to be free from an unreasonable risk of harm, saying that children "often age out of care more damaged than when they entered." 

Lawmakers are considering a bill that would prohibit the Department of Family and Protective Services from making a finding of "abuse" or "neglect" against a parent who surrenders parental rights to get a child mental health care.

The North Texas Municipal Water District could lift some of the tough Stage Three water restrictions tomorrow – including twice-a-month lawn watering.

The District’s Denise Hickey says once-a-week watering would be the most likely change. She says recent rains have restored lake levels.

Hickey: Lake Lavon has returned back to full elevation. We’ve received 20 inches of rain there. We’ve had additional rain inflow at Lake Jim Chapman. However, we still remain without 28% of our supply from Lake Texoma.

That’s because they don’t Zebra Mussels to spread beyond Texoma.