Committee approves parent accountability bill

Committee approves parent accountability bill March 5, 2025

Rep. Robert Duvall, R-Bowling Green, speaks on House Bill 621 before the House Primary and Secondary Education Committee on Wednesday. Parents of children adjudicated for terroristic threatening could be fined under the legislation. A high-resolution photo can be found here.

FRANKFORT — Parents of children adjudicated for terroristic threatening could be fined under House Bill 621.

The House Primary and Secondary Education Committee advanced the legislation on Wednesday. Rep. Robert Duvall, R-Bowling Green, is the primary sponsor of the bill.

“House Bill 621 simply allows the courts the option to impose a fine to the parents of the child based upon the determination that law enforcement incurred excessive cost responding to the offense,” Duvall said. “It also puts the child in contact with the mental health professional.”

Studies show that disengaged or negligent parents are often the cause for delinquency and minors committing major crimes, Duvall said.

“This will create a safer society we can all be proud of. But when parents are not parenting, they must be held accountable,” he added. “And House Bill 621 does just that.”

Steve Chappell, who serves as the Warren County Safe Schools Administrator through the Warren County Sheriff’s Office, testified alongside Duvall.

He told the committee that threats against schools “spread like wildfire” and require a lot of resources to investigate.

“I have to pull resources from other schools to go to that school the threat was directed at and that leaves our other schools vulnerable,” Chappell said. “Not only that, if it’s an online threat, we have to track down who the user was, what the handle was, and then we have to get federal agencies involved a lot of times. FBI and Homeland Security assist us with that.”

Chappell said more tools are needed when it comes holding people accountable for terroristic threatening against schools.

“With this bill, I think that it would help,” he added. “… This would hold the parents accountable to some degree as far as checking their students’ phones and seeing what they’re looking at.”

Rep. Tina Bojanowski, D-Louisville, asked if there are any other state laws that fine parents for a crime their child commits. Duvall said he wasn’t aware of any.

Rep. Josh Calloway, R-Irvington, said he had the same question as Bojanowski and some other concerns about the bill.

Calloway said he worries the bill doesn’t take into consideration parents of adopted children or foster children who are dealing with reactive attachment disorder and other parents who are aware and actively helping their child.

“It just seems like (the bill’s language) is extremely open and allows for just a lot of leeway in the judicial system to decide what they think, instead of us telling them specifically in statute this is how you can charge and when you can charge,” Calloway said.

Duvall said HB 621 is not a mandate.

“This legislation would simply allow the courts to look at this as an option,” he said. “… This is not a ‘shall’ it is a ‘may.’”

Rep. Lisa Willner, D-Louisville, also had concerns about the language of the legislation. She said she understands terroristic threatening in schools is a serious issue, but asked about “the child shall be detained” provision and if it would allow for diversion programs.

Duvall said his intent for the bill would be for the child to be assessed by a mental health professional and referred to counseling and other services if needed.

Willner said she is “100% behind” that idea, and asked Duvall if he would be willing to work on an amendment to make that intention clearer in the legislation. Duvall said he would look into that.

Rep. Steve Riley, R-Glasgow, also spoke on the mental health aspect of threats in schools. He told the committee about a student who recently died by suicide in his district who may have been influenced by online behavior.

“We’re having our young people’s lives destroyed because of threats that are being made, whether they be online or at school or whatever they may be,” Riley said. “As a society, we’ve got to start holding people accountable, whether they’re teenagers who know better or their parents for activities that harm our students, and in many cases, the people who work at our schools.”

The committee approved HB 621 by a 10-2 vote with five pass votes.

Rep. James Tipton, R-Taylorsville, said he thinks parents are responsible for the actions of their children.

“I think this is a very appropriate first step, and I appreciate you for bringing it Representative Duvall,” he added.

HB 621 now goes before the full House for consideration.

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https://apps.legislature.ky.gov/publicservices/pio/release.html#HB621-030525