A political drama is brewing between the Cabinet for Health and Family Services and the recently moved Commonwealth Office of the Ombudsman.

The ombudsman office is responsible for investigating the Cabinet to ensure it is efficiently and effectively serving Kentuckians. A 2023 law moved it outside the CHFS, instead attaching it to the state auditor’s office to allow for more independence in its investigations.

But now, the cabinet says it cannot transfer a key database – including complaints, social work order notes, child abuse allegations and foster children data – to the new ombudsman office.

Tuesday, Auditor Allison Ball sent Cabinet Secretary Eric Friedlander a demand letter explaining why the cabinet can and should grant access to the iTWIST database.

However, the Cabinet maintains that under current law, it cannot.

The transition process

During the 2023 session, Sen. Stephen Meredith, R-Leitchfield, sponsored a bill reorganizing the Cabinet for Health and Family Services.

The legislation passed on party lines, without Gov. Andy Beshear’s signature. According to Meredith, the goal was to improve the cabinet’s operations as the state’s largest executive branch.

In a statement, Meredith said the bill’s “clear intent” was for the ombudsman to have access to the iTWIST database.

Section 102 of the bill states: “Organizational units, employees, or contractors of the Cabinet for Health and Family Services shall not willfully obstruct an investigation, restrict access to records or personnel, or retaliate against a complainant or cabinet employee.”

It also directs the transfer of “(a)ll programmatic staff, personnel, records, files, equipment, resources, funding and administrative functions of the Office of the Ombudsman and Administrative review” to the new office.

“This common-sense reform ends the practice of the cabinet investigating itself,” Meredith said. “The language of this bill is clear and undeniable. It’s worth noting that CHFS did not testify in opposition to the bill.”

The iTWIST transfer issue came up after the end of the 2024 legislative session, after over a year of “good meetings,” Ball said.

For Ball, the timing arouses suspicion.

“It does give me concern,” she said. “It does create alarm in me that there’s a reason why this job is being sabotaged.”

The Cabinet’s argument

CHFS Spokesperson Stephanie French cited a section of Kentucky’s juvenile code – KRS 620.050 – to explain why the agency is no longer providing iTWIST database access.

Section five of the cited statute delineates who has access to reports of suspected child abuse, neglect or dependency, as well as all information obtained by the cabinet through investigations and assessments.

Information is confidential. However, some groups can receive it:

• People suspected of causing dependency, neglect, or abuse;
• Parents and legal guardian of children who are allegedly dependent, neglected, or abused;
• People within the cabinet with a legitimate interest or responsibility related to the case;
• A licensed child-caring facility or child-placing agency evaluating placement for or serving a child who is the alleged victim of an abuse, neglect, or dependency report;
• Other medical, psychological, educational, or social service agencies, child care administrators, corrections personnel, or law enforcement agencies, including the county attorney’s office, the coroner, and the local child fatality response team, that have a legitimate interest in the case;
• A noncustodial parent when there is substantiated dependency, neglect, or abuse;
• Members of certain multidisciplinary teams;
• Employees or designated agents of a children’s advocacy center;
• People authorized by court order; or
• Kentucky’s external child fatality and near fatality review panel.

“The cabinet supports the auditor’s office desire to have full access to the system, but the current statutes passed by the General Assembly prohibit it,” French said in a statement.

“The cabinet supports changing the applicable laws in the next session to provide full access. In the meantime, we have been working with the auditor’s office to provide them with the maximum access allowed under the current law, but they have refused.”

Ball called the cabinet’s reading of the statute a “torturous, erroneous interpretation.”

She said the juvenile code statute doesn’t apply to this situation, but even if it did, the ombudsman office could be considered a social services agency, included on the exceptions list.

What happens now?

Ball said the office of the ombudsman cannot do its job without access to iTWIST.

Now, the cabinet is telling the office that if it says what it is looking for, any information needed for investigation can be provided, Ball said.

“When you’re investigating somebody, if you tell them what you’re looking for, and you leave it up to them to give it to you, you have no confidence that you’re actually getting everything you need,” she said.

Ball is concerned that the Cabinet is risking access to federal grant funds by preventing access to investigations.

This is important for Kentuckians, she said, because of several recent high-profile controversies concerning the cabinet.

Last month, an infant was found dead in Ohio County after alleged child abuse and abandonment by her parents.

In recent years, the cabinet has housed foster children in state office buildings to sleep because of a lack of foster homes or alternative options.

The office has received dozens of emails since the transition on July 1, asking the office to look into something related to the cabinet’s work.

“I’m not trying to start a battle,” Ball said. “I just want to make sure the people of Kentucky are served the way they’re supposed to be. And that means having full access in this office, being able to do the work that the General Assembly has told it to do.”

Thursday, Gov. Andy Beshear weighed in on the situation. He said the cabinet can’t do anything until the law changes.

“I don’t think the General Assembly is going to tell me that if you think that that you know what we wanted you to do that you can ignore the other statutes that we passed on the books,” he said.