Little information on child abuse and neglect hotlines and screening tools is available publicly, and research on the screening process remains limited. To examine how New York State could bring its hotline in line with rigorous, data-driven approaches used in other states, FPP spoke to experts on hotline practices and interviewed state and county hotline leaders in five states in-depth. Here, we profile four states to explain the process of developing a screening tool and undertaking broader hotline improvements.
- Hotline A started examining its hotline in response to a cumbersome screening process that was burdening staff and producing long wait times and inconsistent results. A significant state investment allowed the agency to rebuild its screening system, including by developing a Structured Decision-Making tool and by building the training, quality assurance and oversight processes to put it into practice. Currently, the agency is using insights from its screening data to inform the development of upstream family supports.
- Hotline B was an early adopter of a structured screening tool and this county hotline has since focused on continuous learning and refinement of its approach using data and feedback. This agency also has worked to develop alternative pathways to address family needs as part of a broader, coordinated effort across systems and community providers. Hotline leaders describe this as a gradual, evolving process of aligning screening decisions to enhance family safety.
- Hotline C is in the early stages of its reform process. Like New York, it has a very low rate of screened-out calls. A state task force began looking at patterns in reporting practices several years ago and the state hired Child Trends to specifically examine its hotline, including a review of its screening practice and development of a change management plan. The state is now planning to create a standardized screening tool.
- Hotline D restructured its screening system after centralizing its hotline, as well as in response to staffing constraints and a duplicative intake process that was generating long call times. As a first step, the state developed a structured and streamlined call script focused on gathering the core information needed to assess a report. Later, the agency also allowed a local override of the screen-in determination and integrated new technology to automate data entry. State legislation also narrowed the definition of neglect, allowing for increased screen-outs.
Note: In three of these jurisdictions, the investigation rate is lower than the rate in New York state. In one jurisdiction, state statutes much more broadly define maltreatment than under New York law and the investigation rate is higher. Numbers are provided with each case study. In New York, for comparison:
- 1 report to the hotline for every 20 children in 2024
- 26% of hotline calls screened out
- 1 in 21 children experienced an investigation
Read No Filter, Still
New York’s hotline screens out far fewer calls than most states. FPP’s 2026 report documents how rigorous screening practices used across the country could reduce investigations, but the state has yet to act.
Profile: Hotline A
• 1 report for every 10 children in 2024
• About 60% of hotline calls screened out
• Almost 1 in 18 children experienced an investigation
Problem
Hotline A started to examine and make significant changes to its screening processes more than 5 years ago, after consolidating multiple regional hotlines into a centralized system. Overall, the hotline receives a very high volume of calls, in part because of statutes that set an unusually low threshold for what risk of harm must be reported and investigated. The hotline screening process also was cumbersome, seeking information on six different domains of children and family’s functioning, apart from the allegation itself. As a result, hotline callers were facing long wait times. An external review also found limited training and structural support for staff. In addition, investigators reported that many families did not need a child protective response, but there was no path to route concerns to other family-serving systems.
System Overhaul
A significant state investment allowed the child welfare agency to build a new screening system “from the ground up” over a number of years. The first phase of reform included creating work groups to examine practice and planning; review needed policy, practice and training changes, and plan for how the agency would measure and improve its work over time.
The agency made stakeholder engagement a core part of this process, bringing in community partners, reporting professionals, the judiciary as well as advocates at every stage. This meant that a broad community of stakeholders was engaged in questioning the scope and role of the hotline and what an effective screening tool should accomplish.
Developing Criteria for the Decision-Making Tool
A critical part of the reform process was examining the state’s legal definitions of child maltreatment. State statutes left “a lot to be interpreted,” with limited guidance on how definitions could be applied at the hotline. For instance, at what age can a child be left home alone? How does that change if the child has a disability or requires additional supervision?
Working with Department of Justice attorneys, community partners and advocates with lived experience, the agency worked to develop a shared understanding of what the legal definitions meant in practice and how screening criteria and suggested questions could allow these definitions to be applied consistently.
The agency also needed to simplify its screening model, which required hotline staff to collect extensive information. The volume and breadth of information required proved unworkable; call times that averaged an hour led to staff feeling “very flooded.” The agency recognized that it needed to narrow the focus of information collection on what was most relevant: “What do they know, how do they know it, and how does that inform ‘reasonable suspicion’ for the statute’s definitions of abuse?”
Hotline A hired Evident Change to build a tool that cut out some of the extensive information-gathering while increasing the specificity of questions that screeners used to determine whether an investigation was necessary. The tool included subcategories and specific questions for each maltreatment type, which popped up on the screen for hotline staff to use in real time. The agency then put the tool through “rigorous usability testing” to ensure that different staff would consistently gather the information they needed and make reliable and accurate decisions.
The agency has seen the new, streamlined tool provide structure for hotline staff navigating complex decisions under pressure. As one administrator described, having a decision-making tool available “when you’re tired, when you’re overworked, when your workload is high” makes a meaningful difference.
Importantly, the tool “does not make decisions for screeners,” but rather “helps screeners narrow in on what is being reported to what is meeting that threshold.” The goal was to increase the accuracy, consistency and equity of screening decisions, while also creating an auditable record of how decisions were made.
Training, Coaching and Supervision
In addition to the tool itself, the agency built a year-long onboarding process, recognizing that “it takes so much practice to utilize structured decision-making at a hotline” and that staff “need a lot of coaching outside of their supervisor.” Onboarding and training for hotline staff now includes:
- Participation in multiple weeks of a training academy to study the fundamentals of state law and the screening process, learn how to use the tool to support critical thinking and application of the statutes, and conduct mock calls and listen in on live calls;
- Post-academy one-on-one coaching support from a specialist for multiple weeks;
- A competency evaluation at three months, after which staff can transition to working remotely;
- Shifts scheduled with their unit supervisor for the remainder of the year to ensure they have access to guidance as needed;
- Whole staff training three times a year to review practice, decision-making and information about new changes in the screening process.
Continuous Quality Improvement
Separate from supervision, Hotline A has a “continuous quality improvement (CQI) team that regularly collects and uses information to improve practices and outcomes at the hotline. The CQI team oversees three types of call reviews in the hotline:
- Sampling of up to 3 reports per screener per quarter;
- Joining live call to examine caller engagement and whether hotline staff are effectively screening and navigating callers to any appropriate supports;
- Examining reports that CPS investigators have flagged in disagreement with a screen-in decision, for a potential overturn.
The CQI team produces quarterly reports that identify trends or areas needing improvement. Findings are then integrated into the program to refine questions. Learnings from the CQI team also are shared with the larger CPS system to inform future practice and decision-making, as well as integrated into public education efforts around “mandated supporting.” For instance, data from the CQI process has informed guidance to reporters on when concerns about a child’s basic needs, like clothing, can be addressed through a community support pathway rather than a hotline call.
As a hotline leader shared, “We are not siloed or disconnected from the rest of the child-serving system, and it really takes leadership and infrastructure to support that continuous learning and adjusting and flexibility of our rules and our practices as we refine our understanding of families and how we’re serving them.”
The CQI team also reviews child fatalities involving families known to the department, and that can contribute to screening adjustments. Following one of these reviews, the agency updated its screening questions for children with developmental disabilities to ensure hotline staff were guided to gather sufficient information about a child’s development, functioning, supervision and medical needs before making a screening decision.
Reflecting on the combination of the tool and the CQI infrastructure built around it, the administrator noted that together they “made all the difference.”
Results from Screening Reform
Hotline A has seen tangible results from its reform efforts. Wait times at the hotline dropped, and the agency screened-out 10% more calls in 2024 compared to 2019, with 14% fewer children experiencing an investigation. Further reductions may be hampered by current state statutes, which use an unusually low threshold for requiring an investigation and do not distinguish between neglect and conditions of poverty––limiting the scope of screening reform.
Concurrent Reform Ideas Outside the Hotline
One central question throughout the assessment phase was: What would be the most effective response to this type of concern? Data showed that a large number of screened-in reports involved families where children were not in danger but the family could benefit from material support. The CPS investigation was not serving as an effective pathway to address this need. The state recognized that it needed to build up “other pathways to serve these families.”
The agency has examined screen-out data to understand where families in need are going unserved. The state is using this to inform the development of “navigation and community resource hubs” and “upstream prevention” services to ensure that families can find support they may want or need without an unnecessary investigation.
Profile: Hotline B
• 1 report to the hotline for every 11 children in 2025
• More than 80% of hotline calls screened out
• About 1 in 65 children experienced an investigation
Maintaining the Balance
This state’s county-based hotline system has used a structured decision-making tool for many years. At this stage, Hotline B’s challenge has been to maintain fidelity to its screening tool while incorporating new information and feedback to make targeted adjustments.
A hotline leader shared that they have experienced pressure from various stakeholders to either screen-in or screen-out more calls. Community advocates seeking reduced state intervention have said, “Stop coming out…we can take care of our own.” The county navigates competing pressures from some mandated reporting professionals, including law enforcement, educators and medical professionals, who want an “extra set of eyes” and “extra support” for families they are concerned about.
The county has also worked to expand the options available for families who need support but not a child protective response. Given its very high call volume, the county is now working to ensure that reporters can better assess whether a hotline call is warranted and can more often connect families to support directly.
Using Specificity in the Tool to Think Critically
A system leader shared that the hotline relies on the screening tool to provide a foundation for the appropriate balance in difficult determinations, saying, “That’s where structured decision-making comes in.”
The agency also has focused on training to guide reporters away from speculating about what might happen and toward what is actually known, “We really try to get people away from the ‘what if’ to the ‘what is.’” For instance, an educator reported that a 10 year old was spanked the night before, with “no report of injuries, no report of any pain,” which does not meet the state’s criteria to be screened in for an investigation. Similarly, a report about a child coming to school in the same clothes did not require a child protective response but might instead benefit from a referral to community services to address a material need. Training for hotline staff emphasizes that, unless children are in danger, the agency does not need to “jump in the way we used to because we know that research shows a lot of times systems create more harm.”
Across all allegations, the decision-making tool guides hotline staff through a detailed inquiry. On calls involving a parent’s substance use, for instance, staff must gather relevant context to assess whether the child is at “substantial risk of suffering serious physical harm,” including considering whether the parent is directly exposing their child to danger or whether there is another adult or support system that has stepped in to care for the child. That structure and the consistency of screening decisions provides both clarity and safety for staff: “We have to have a system whereby when we’re questioned,” about a screen-out decision, “we can say, ‘Well, this is why we didn’t,’” explained the hotline director.
The county also maintains close feedback loops with stakeholders, regularly getting feedback like, “We made a call. You guys didn’t screen it in. Can you please take a second look?” They also hear when child protective investigators receive a referral that they thought shouldn’t have been screened-in. This ongoing feedback informs targeted practice adjustments over time.
The agency described needing to recalibrate after feedback suggested that tightened screening standards may have gone too far for certain domestic violence calls. While hotline staff had been trained to focus on callers’ observations of children’s physical and emotional safety, the hotline began to field concerns that this focus sometimes overlooked the risks faced by very young children, who may not show observable signs of distress. “It’s unrealistic that we’re not going to need to tweak things and learn,” said the hotline director, who made changes to the protocol.
Connecting Families to Resources
This hotline sees its role as the “front door” to a “collective system” that seeks to direct “calls that aren’t meant for us” to the appropriate pathway. For instance, the county has a team to connect the reporter or family to voluntary preventive services or a community provider when calls “don’t meet our criteria, but there’s an identified need for the family,” such as a concern about a child’s mental health or a family’s housing instability.
The county’s community referrals have almost doubled in recent years. One key shift has been to have community-based service providers make first contact with families rather than the hotline, which has increased uptake. Research initiated by the county on families’ experience of these pathways has helped identify and replicate what works. As the administrator noted, building this infrastructure has “been an evolving change; it didn’t happen overnight.”
Training Reporters to Support, Not Report
In a recent initiative, the county has taken steps to reduce overreporting by training frontline professionals in “mandated supporting.” The county released a decision-making tool to help reporters assess whether a call to the hotline is warranted and to identify supportive resources they can connect families to directly.
Reporters can also call the hotline for a consultation about whether a report is needed. The “call and consult” option was used by almost a third of callers. If a call does not meet screening criteria, hotline staff are trained to “talk about options–how we can support the family and how they can support the family.”
Profile: Hotline C
• 1 report to the hotline for every 24 children in 2024
• Fewer than 30% of hotline calls screened out
• About 1 in 26 children experienced an investigation
Identifying the Problem
This state began examining its hotline after the formation of a task force on poverty and disproportionality in the child welfare system. The agency sought to understand how its reporting and screening practices could be improved to “better distinguish between instances of true neglect and conditions of poverty.” Findings from the task force revealed that the state was “investigating so many cases,” with very few resulting in a finding of abuse or neglect. The state recognized that its very low screen-out rate was a contributor.
Assessing Reporting Practice
The task force examined state data and studied mandated reporter experiences to understand how policy and practice changes could strengthen decision-making in reporting.
This process revealed that mandated reporters wanted more training on when to make a report, and clearer guidance on how to support families when a situation doesn’t warrant one. As one reporter shared, “If I have a concern that doesn’t meet the state’s definition of being concerned, but clinically I’m concerned, what am I supposed to do with those patients who are in the gray area that doesn’t overburden the system?”
The task force issued recommendations for a multi-year roadmap, including providing more rigorous and tailored mandated reporter training and legislation to narrow reporting categories.
Assessing Screening Practice
As part of its reform efforts, the state determined that its screening system needed a complete overhaul. “We’re hoping to reduce the amount of calls that are screened in by a considerable amount, hopefully 50 percent,” a state leader said, adding, “At least 25 percent.” The state hired Child Trends to examine hotline best practices and develop a roadmap to change.
Hotline C’s current screening system, like New York’s, provides staff with a “long laundry list of definitions” to reference when determining whether a call should be screened-in but no standardized questions to guide decision-making. Child Trends found that hotline staff had little guidance on how to apply state definitions to calls and recommended working with Evident Change to implement a rigorous, data-driven tool.
Gaps in Pathways to Family Support
The assessment has already lifted up broader tensions and uncovered gaps that contribute to over-reporting and unnecessary child welfare involvement. Hotline staff shared that screening-in a report is, at times, the only mechanism available to connect families to “immediate help.”
For instance, state policy is clear that housing instability should not, in and of itself, be considered neglect. However, there are times that a CPS case is the only way to ensure that the family has immediate access to a safe place to sleep, putting hotline staff in a bind. Staff shared that they “would feel more comfortable screening cases out if they had somewhere else to send the families.”
Looking Ahead
Hotline C is currently selecting a vendor to develop a structured decision-making tool, while simultaneously working to update its technology system to integrate the tool.
Beyond the screening tool, Child Trends recommended that the agency coordinate with family-serving agencies to “not only increase the availability of services but [also] increase communication about the services and what’s available,” ensuring coordination across the screening tool, mandated reporter training and local child protective practice.
Child Trends also recommended that the state develop stronger direct referral pathways––for instance, by investing in a state helpline where parents can get information and referrals––so that families receive support through more appropriate agencies or local organizations.
Profile: Hotline D
• 1 report for every 22 children in 2024
• About 50% of hotline calls screened out
• About 1 in 23 children experienced an investigation
Centralizing the Hotline Spotlighted Screening Problems
When this state centralized its hotline, it became clear that its screening process was not working—calls were too long, information gathering was inconsistent and duplicative, and without a standardized decision-making framework, too many reports were being screened-in that did not warrant an investigation.
Country screenings had been done by “case managers who took phone calls,” not identified intake staff, one hotline leader described. Therefore, calls were lasting 45 minutes to an hour, driven in part by an open-ended format.
The centralized hotline also was required to review the family’s case record in depth on every call—even though records were re-reviewed by county investigators. That approach collected “all this information that we really wouldn’t even need” and placed a significant burden on a small staff.
The low screen-out rate was also generating significant costs, as local CPS investigators were regularly responding to reports that did not warrant investigation. “It really drains your resources when you could shift those over to families that can really use services.”
A Quick-Burst Improvement Process
Over time, this state made a series of changes to their screening process that led to a sustained increase in the state’s screen-out rate, from about 25% of referrals 10 years ago to 50%. About 30,000 fewer children experienced an investigation in 2024 compared to 2014, with investigations falling by 20% even as calls to the hotline rose 20%. These reforms are also linked to a higher substantiation rate – suggesting that fewer reports are being screened-in inappropriately.
Screening changes began with a “Rapid Process Improvement”—a quick burst of design and implementation—in which the state developed a simple and structured call format to elicit the core information needed to assess a report. Questions include: “Is there a true concern of abuse or neglect? What is that based on? What were the observations?”
This effort was part of a broader reorientation to the distinct screening role of the hotline, separate from casework. As one administrator described, “We started to embrace the call center aspect.”
Adding a Local Screen
The hotline centralization and low screen-out rate had also created pushback from counties. Local CPS have access to more information about families than hotline staff. They may “already know that services are being provided or maybe they’ve just come out of working with a family.” They also review the entire case record. The county agencies wanted to be able to screen out reports that they did not believe should be investigated.
In response, the state created an “override process.” Counties were able to flag cases they believed should not be screened in, sending it back to the hotline with a justification for screening it out. After tracking and monitoring this process for two years, hotline leaders saw that 1% or fewer intakes were overridden by the counties. After that, the state authorized a local screening function. Counties can override a screened-in report without the hotline’s approval and can also elevate a screened-out call if local knowledge suggests a closer look is warranted.
For the local screening to function well, officials noted that the most critical factor was ongoing communication between the centralized hotline and county staff.
Tightening the System’s Focus on Harm
In recent years, the hotline’s approach to screening has also been affected by legislation that changed how neglect and inadequate supervision are defined. The state is one of many that has adopted a “reasonable childhood independence” law and now requires evidence of “willful intent or willful lack of oversight” to screen in a report.
For instance, a neighbor’s concern about a child arriving home alone after school could previously have been screened-in. Under the new standard, if a parent made a plan for their child and there is no indication of potential harm, the report is not accepted. As one administrator explained, the shift “gives parents the ability to parent and make the decision that they need to make for their child.”
The narrower definition has also allowed the state to focus more on cases where there is a reasonable safety concern. County staff are no longer being sent “out into the field to do work with families that really don’t require it”—a shift that officials describe as better both for staff and for families. “Allowing parents to be parents has assisted us with being able to screen out more and really be able to target those more high-level safety concern situations.”
Taking Incremental Steps
The state hotline undertook its screening reform over time, recognizing that “it can be very scary to screen things out when you were known to not screen-out.” It helped that most hotline staff came to this work with a background as CPS investigators; staff are allowed to work remotely to enable hiring of former CPS from across the state.
Intake staff who have handled unnecessary reports “understand what you’re trying to do and why.” As one leader put it: “It’s one thing to say you know how to put out fires, but if you’ve never held a fire hose.”
Refining the screening process is a continual process. A few years ago, the state also introduced new technology that streamlined data entry during the intake process, further reducing the time it takes for intake staff to collect basic information. Streamlining the intake process also has reduced the length of hotline calls and the number of staff needed to take calls, from about 200 to 160 staff.
Officials are clear that no single change accounts for the shift in outcomes; the guiding script, new intake technology, legislative changes and local screening function all contributed. Reforms were also supported by state leadership. As one hotline leader shared, “One without the other may not have had as much impact.”