S.F. No. 1796 reorganizes into a new chapter the Maltreatment of Minors Act currently found in Minnesota Statutes, section 626.556. Nonpartisan staff from the Revisor’s Office, House Research, and the Office of Senate Counsel prepared the language in consultation with the Department of Human Services.

The intent of this bill is to include the statutes relating to child maltreatment with the other chapters relating to child welfare issues (chapters 260, 260A, 260B, 260C, and 260D), and to reorganize the child maltreatment statutes to match the sequence in which child maltreatment issues arise and proceed. To carry out this intent, Article 1 of the bill proposes coding in chapter 260A. Article 2 of the bill then makes conforming changes to statutory cross-references to the reorganized sections. The bill does not make substantive changes to the reorganized statutes.