Spurred by grief and outrage over the deaths of two young girls who were murdered by their respective mothers, lawmakers established New Hampshire’s Office of the Child Advocate in 2017 to improve oversight of the state’s troubled child welfare system.
Now, driven by a mission to cut state spending, Republican lawmakers in the New Hampshire House are pushing to eliminate the office altogether — an effort that caught stakeholders off-guard last week.
The potential elimination of this office,which provides an additional layer of external scrutiny and accountability for the state agencies tasked with protecting at-risk children, comes as New Hampshire has long struggled to keep children safe.
The murders of 3-year-old Brielle Gage in Nashua in 2014 and 21-month-old Sadence “Sadie’’ Willott in Manchester in 2015 sparked calls for reform, since state authorities had known both families but failed to protect the girls. That led to the creation of New Hampshire’s Office of the Child Advocate.
Still, the tragic headlines continued. In 2019, 5-year-old Harmony Montgomery was beaten to death by her father in Manchester. In 2021, 5-year-old Elijah Lewis was assaulted and neglected by his mother before dying in Merrimack.
Harmony’s disappearance went largely unnoticed for two years before her father was arrested and charged with killing her and disposing of her remains, which still have not been found. That, combined with the fact that a Massachusetts judge granted custody to Harmony’s father months prior to the killing in New Hampshire, prompted outcry and soul-searching about how both states had failed to protect the child.
Amid further questions about what authorities should do differently, lawmakers expanded the New Hampshire Office of the Child Advocate’s oversight role in 2020.
Cassandra L. Sanchez, who was appointed as New Hampshire’s child advocate in 2022 to lead a team that independently investigates complaints about the New Hampshire Division of Children, Youth and Families and recommends system-wide improvements to state services, said nobody gave her any warning that her office would be on the chopping block.
“We did not know that this was going to happen,’’ she said. “It was not mentioned at all as a potential during our budget hearing, so it came as a shock.’’
There are now 33 states with either a child advocate office or children’s ombudsman, according to the National Conference of State Legislatures. But a pending proposal would remove New Hampshire from that list.
With a 5-4 vote last week, a division of the New Hampshire House Finance Committee endorsed an amendment to the state’s next two-year budget that would eliminate the Office of the Child Advocate, to cut spending by about $1 million per year.
The proposal still has a long way to go. If the full committee signs off, the legislation would advance to the full House, and it would still need approval from the Senate and the governor to take effect when the next fiscal year begins, on July 1.
The amendment was among several introduced by Republican Representative Dan McGuire of Epsom, who chairs Division I of the committee. McGuire said certain “little agencies’’ should be nixed from the budget, not because they are doing poorly, but just because the state must find ways to reduce spending where it can.
“We need the money,’’ he said. “I don’t know how to put it any blunter.’’
Although the roughly $16 billion budget plan that Republican Governor Kelly A. Ayotte submitted to lawmakers last month included funding to keep the Office of the Child Advocate running in fiscal years 2026 and 2027, the Legislature’s latest revenue projections are significantly lower than the governor’s were, and the final budget must balance spending against expected revenues. The chair of the committee, Republican Representative Kenneth L. Weyler of Kingston, said there is no plan to propose new taxes, so lawmakers are looking to trim.
Democratic Representative Rosemarie Rung of Merrimack said during last week’s meeting that the Office of the Child Advocate works to ensure, among other things, that children held in state-run youth detention facilities aren’t being mistreated.
Considering how the state is now spending millions to settle decades-old allegations of physical and sexual abuse at such facilities, Rung said allocating $1 million per year to keep this watchdog office operating seems likely to save the state money in the long run.
“It’s penny-wise and pound-foolish to get rid of this,’’ Rung said.
Sanchez said her team meets regularly with children and staff at the Sununu Youth Services Center, formerly known as the Youth Development Center, to ensure the kids and teens there are safe and having their needs met.
“There was no oversight of that sort when all of the issues played out that have now led to lawsuits,’’ Sanchez said.
Representative Alexis Simpson of Exeter, the Democratic minority leader in the House, said the Office of the Child Advocate has proven itself useful in other areas, too, by revealing problems and helping to shape legislative solutions.
“It is outrageous,’’ Simpson said, “that Republicans are attempting to fund tax breaks for the ultra-wealthy by cutting essential government oversight designed to protect vulnerable children.’’
This budget cycle is the first since New Hampshire fully phased out its interest and dividends tax, which had generated $184 million in state revenues last fiscal year by taxing the investments of predominantly higher-income Granite Staters.
Ayotte wasn’t in the governor’s office when Republican state lawmakers decided to phase out the I&D tax. But on the campaign trail last year, she defended their decision to do so and promised to “never allow an income or sales tax’’ in the state.
A spokesperson for Ayotte did not respond last week to a request for comment on whether the governor would support or oppose a budget plan that eliminates the Office of the Child Advocate. Republican leaders in the House, including Speaker Sherman A. Packard of Londonderry, did not respond to requests for comment either.
As the child advocate, Sanchez has sometimes found herself at odds with Republican lawmakers, including when she spoke out last year against several of their anti-LGBTQ proposals.
There may be fractures forming within the GOP caucus on whether to move forward with the recommendation. Republican Representative Kimberly A. Rice of Hudson suggested in a social media post last week that she wouldn’t support a budget plan that excludes the Office of the Child Advocate.
Sanchez said she understands money is tight.
“But I don’t see the value in eliminating something that comes at such a small cost and is protecting one of the most vulnerable populations in our state,’’ she said.
Sanchez and the eight employees in her office are far less worried about their own employment prospects than they are about what will happen if New Hampshire does away with an office that focuses on the needs of children who are at risk.
“If that doesn’t exist,’’ she said, “I worry what’s going to happen with our children.’’
Steven Porter can be reached at steven.porter@globe.com. Follow him @reporterporter.
