Establishment and Maintenance of Central Registries for Child Abuse or Neglect Reports - North Carolina

Establishment

Citation: Gen. Stat. §§ 7B-311; 7B-101(18b)

The Department of Health and Human Services shall maintain a central registry and a list of responsible individuals. A 'responsible individual' is defined as a parent, guardian, custodian, caregiver, or individual responsible for subjecting a juvenile to human trafficking who abuses or seriously neglects a child. 

Purpose

Citation: Gen. Stat. § 7B-311

The central registry shall be used for the following:

• To compile data for the appropriate study of the extent of abuse and neglect in the State
• To identify repeated abuses of the same child or other children in the same family

The department may provide information from the responsible individuals list to child-caring institutions, child-placing agencies, group home facilities, and other providers of foster care, child care, or adoption services that need to determine the fitness of individuals to care for or adopt children.

Contents

Citation: Gen. Stat. § 7B-311

The central registry shall contain cases of child abuse, neglect, dependency, and child fatalities that are the result of alleged maltreatment.

Maintenance

Citation: Gen. Stat. § 7B-311

Data shall be confidential and subject to policies adopted by the Social Services Commission for its use and appropriate disclosure.

The Social Services Commission shall adopt rules regarding the operation of the central registry and responsible individuals list, including procedures for each of the following:

• Filing data
• Notifying an individual that the individual has been determined by the director to be a responsible individual
• Correcting and expunging information
• Determining persons who are authorized to receive information from the responsible individuals list 
• Releasing information from the responsible individuals list to authorized requestors
• Gathering statistical information
• Keeping and maintaining information placed in the registry and on the responsible individuals list