AN ACT Relating to reporting child sex abuse;
SB 5665 is a Washington child-protection bill focused on reporting, investigating, and responding to child abuse and neglect, with a particular emphasis on child sexual abuse. The bill expands and clarifies the definitions used in the child welfare chapter, including abuse, neglect, sexual exploitation, child forensic interviews, children’s advocacy centers, and related terms. It also revises mandatory reporting rules so that a broad range of professionals and adults with reason to believe a child has been abused or neglected must report, and it adds specific provisions addressing clergy, clergy-penitent privilege, and sacred confidence.
The bill also restructures how the Department of Children, Youth, and Families responds to reports. It authorizes both traditional investigations and a family assessment response, sets out when each response may be used, and establishes timelines, interview practices, recordkeeping, and notification requirements. It requires the department to maintain records, use risk assessment processes, notify law enforcement and prosecutors in specified cases, and provide public-facing reporting guidance materials. The bill further directs educational service district superintendents and the Superintendent of Public Instruction to collect and report data on sexual abuse investigations and to develop screening, training, and audit systems for school employees and volunteers.
SB 5665 would significantly amend Washington’s child abuse reporting and child welfare statutes in RCW chapter 26.44 and related education provisions. It broadens mandatory reporting obligations, clarifies who must report and when, and creates detailed procedures for the Department of Children, Youth, and Families and law enforcement when handling abuse and neglect allegations. It also adds new duties for educational service districts and the Superintendent of Public Instruction related to data collection, reporting, and prevention systems, and it creates or revises statutory definitions that would affect schools, child welfare agencies, clergy, health professionals, and other mandated reporters.
The bill’s overall tone is strongly protective of children and supportive of stronger reporting and prevention systems. The legislative findings emphasize the need for more robust training, background checks, psychological screening, and data collection, and the bill appears designed to increase accountability across schools, child-serving institutions, and religious settings. No committee transcript or vote history was provided, so there is no recorded floor or committee sentiment to summarize beyond the bill’s stated policy direction.
The main area of contention in the bill text is the treatment of clergy reporting obligations and the limits of religious privilege. The bill states that clergy should be treated like other mandatory reporters while also acknowledging constitutional protections for religious practice and sacred sacraments, including penance and reconciliation. It narrows the clergy-penitent privilege by requiring reporting when information is obtained outside a sacred confidence, which could raise concerns from religious organizations about intrusion into pastoral counseling. Another likely point of tension is the bill’s broad expansion of reporting and screening requirements for schools and other institutions, which may be viewed as increasing administrative burdens even as supporters would see them as necessary safeguards.