Safe Haven law amended
An Arkansas law that allows children to be voluntarily surrendered to a medical provider or law enforcement agency has been amended to include manned fire stations. The amendments go into effect July 24.
A manned fire station is defined by the act as “any organization that is staffed 24 hours a day and established for the prevention or extinguishment of fires, including, but not limited to, fire departments organized under municipal or county ordinances, improvement districts, membership fee-based private fire departments, and volunteer fire departments.”
The Safe Haven Act, or Act 185 that amends Arkansas code
5-27-205(c), now reads a parent has a defense against prosecution should they voluntarily surrender, or arrange to leave, their child with a medial provider, law enforcement agency or fire department should the child be 30 days old or younger. The respective agencies shall take the child, without a court order, “if the parent of the child, without expressing an intent to return for the child, leaves the child,” according to the act.
The identity of the parent is to remain anonymous unless the respective agency now responsible for caring for the child works in conjunction with law enforcement to investigate abuse, according to the act. The respective agency will not be “criminally or civilly liable for any good faith acts or omissions,” according to the act.
Siloam Springs Fire Department Chief Jeremy Criner said the department is looking into the logistics behind installing and funding what’s called a “baby box,” an electronic safety device newborns can be placed in should the parent choose to surrender their child, according to Safe Haven Baby Boxes, shbb.org.
The box is electronically monitored and triggers a call to local dispatch centers when the door to the box is opened, according to the website. A sensor inside a bassinet triggers a second alarm when it senses the weight of what’s supposed to be an infant; a third alarm is triggered when the door closes, which both sends another call to the local dispatch center and locks the exterior door, according to the website. Emergency personnel can then retrieve the child and transport it to an area hospital for evaluation, according to the website.
The amendments to the act also require the alarm system be tested at least once a week and the box be checked at least twice a day.
Gallatin Fire Department Chief Don Lawson and Gentry Fire Department Chief Vester Cripps both said that because their stations are not currently staffed 24 hours a day, as required by the act, they will not be pursuing installing baby boxes at their stations.
According to a 2018 annual report produced by Safe Haven Baby Boxes, three newborns were placed into baby boxes in Indiana; 49 women surrendered their newborn to fire or hospital personnel after calling a national hotline, 1-866-99BABY1; and there were six adoption referrals facilitated by the organization.
Arkansas Right to Life, a non-profit organization that works to educate individuals about fetal development, abortion and alternatives to abortion and works to “make possible legal protection of all human beings,” brought attention to the act amendments with a billboard campaign in June.
According to a press release, the billboard campaign’s purpose was to “educate the general public and parents about the Safe Haven Law, advise manned fire departments that they’re now an official surrender location and to promote the option of safe haven baby boxes for those parents who want or need total anonymity in the safe surrender of their baby.”