TALLAHASSEE—Despite Florida lawmakers asking for a record $70 million in compensation for families "neglected" by the state's embattled child welfare agency, all restitution bills related to the department died without committee hearings.
The 2025 session was the first time ever that the Department of Children and Families was the subject of more than three claim bills since its 1996 creation, with over $67 million being sought for five families allegedly wronged by the agency.
But none of the five bills made it to a committee stop.
DCF has faced heavy scrutiny in recent years, first for its call centers. The Tallahassee Democrat which blocked 54% of calls to speak with a representative and hung up on over 700,000 calls in April alone—and most recently after the department called Immigration and Customs Enforcement on an undocumented foster teen.
DCF has not immediately returned a request for comment.
Here's what the five bills this session would have done:
SB 2: Filed by Sen. Ana Maria Rodriguez (R-Doral), this was Rodriguez's third time trying to get the measure across the finish line. The bill asks for $20 million for a Fort Myers boy born in 2014 who overdosed on methadone at 13 months old.
In the months before and after his birth, DCF failed to fully investigate eight complaints against his mother. Now 9 years old, he suffers from seizures, strokes, vision problems, and cognitive impairment.
SB 12: Sen. Joe Gruters (R-Sarasota) filed a claim asking for $28 million in damages for a Sarasota six-year-old, whose mother tried to disembowel her. The girl was stabbed 14 times after DCF left her in her mother's care, despite the adult sending a suicide video to relatives.
It's estimated that she will incur medical and psychological costs for the next 65 years of her life.
SB 18: Gruters also asked for $15 million after a young girl was allegedly abused by her mother and stepfather at 18 months old. Despite two child abuse complaints, she stayed in their care until she was brought to the hospital with life-threatening injuries. She was admitted for 109 days and now suffers permanent brain damage. She cannot walk, talk, eat, or sit up.
SB 32: Sen. Alexis Calatayud's (R-Miami) bill requested $3.8 million for a girl who'd been removed from her parents' custody because of the "present danger" they posed to her. But when DCF placed the child back into her parents' home—after the person watching her said they couldn't anymore—she was brought to the hospital, seizing, bloodied, and bruised.
She was later diagnosed with shaken baby syndrome and malnourishment.
SB 34: Calatayud also requested nearly $300,000 following a child being shot in the neck by his mother's estranged husband. The child's mother and four siblings were also shot and killed, despite police receiving 34 calls to the home in four years. This was the second attempt to pass this bill.
