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Read. Follow. Verify.Ohio HB 896 expands parents' rights and support options in child welfare and dependency cases
Last action · May 20, 2026: Referred to JudiciarySponsors: Darnell Brewer and 1 other
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What This Bill Would Do
Ohio House Bill 896 establishes new rights for parents and custodians involved in child welfare investigations and proceedings, including the right to choose a support person for meetings and requiring the Department of Children and Youth to create a plain-language parents' bill of rights pamphlet. The legislation also modifies mandates regarding reasonable efforts for family reunification, identification timelines, and registry searches.
The measure alters how public children services agencies interact with families under investigation, establishing formal mechanisms for parental support persons, standardized notification timelines, and explicit requirements for documenting reasonable reunification efforts.
Who It Would Affect
Groups the bill's text would affect if enacted, as described in the record. Being affected is not a position for or against it.
parents, guardians, and custodians
Parents gain statutory rights to choose a support person for case plan meetings, receive plain-language explanations of agency efforts, and obtain standardized educational pamphlets regarding child welfare proceedings.
public children services agencies
Agencies must comply with accelerated timelines for kinship caregiver outreach, file plain-language reasonable efforts statements, and perform mandatory putative father registry searches.
department of children and youth
The department is tasked with developing and distributing the parents' bill of rights pamphlet in multiple languages and conducting putative father registry searches upon request.
Key Facts
You don't have to trust us. Each fact below is taken straight from the official document - click any one to see the exact passage, highlighted in the original.
Frequently Asked Questions
Can I bring someone with me to child welfare meetings under this bill?
What information must be included in the parents' bill of rights pamphlet?
What else do you want to know?
News Coverage
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Votes, people, money & the original sourceWhere This Stands
Currently in committee. The next step in the legislative lifecycle is Floor Vote.
Procedural history
2 actions- May 20, 2026HouseCommitteeReferred to Judiciary
- May 12, 2026HouseIntroducedIntroduced
Version history
Only one version on file - nothing to compare yet. As later stages (committee substitute, engrossed, enrolled) are captured, the redline appears here.
View official text →Lobbying Activity
No state lobbying filings in our records match this bill. Federal lobbying reports (LDA) cover Congress, so they are not listed on state bills.
Full breakdown
Who this bill affects and the strongest case for and against it, written only from the bill’s own text.
Sponsors
Discoveries
Patterns POLISCOPE noticed across the record. These are observations to investigate, not conclusions.
Codification of Support Persons and Multi-Language Materials
The legislation introduces formal statutory rights for parents to include support persons in child welfare meetings and mandates multi-language accessibility for parental rights information.
Connected Entities
Sources
www.legislature.ohio.gov
Analysis Score
0–100- Significance75How much this matters to a regular citizen
- Controversy40Intensity of disagreement among stakeholders
- Entertainment5Compellingness for a non-policy-wonk reader
- Buzz25Current news / social attention level
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