BY NICOLE PILSBURY & BRYAN P. SEARS
MARYLAND MATTERS
SEPTEMBER 17, 2025
Maryland lawmakers plan to hold hearings in coming weeks on reports that the Social Services Administration may have let children in its care be housed with registered sex offenders, just one of many allegations in an audit of a “broken” agency.
“We need to make sure that the state — who is charged with overseeing their care — is doing so in the best way possible and ensuring the safety of these children,” said Sen. Shelly Hettleman (D-Baltimore County), co-chair of the Joint Audit and Evaluation Committee, which received the audit on the administration Wednesday.
Hettleman said she expects the committee will hold a hearing in the near future to investigate issues at the administration, a unit of the Department of Human Services that oversees the delivery of care by the state’s 24 local social service departments to about 24,000 children.
The 70-page report from the Office of Legislative Audits found that, among other problems, the state may have approved the placement of children in homes at addresses that were also listed as the address for seven registered sex offenders. Auditors also found that one group of foster care homes had an employee how had been convicted of sexual abuse of a minor, and another vendor that provided care for children being housed in hotels had an employee who was convicted of murder in 1990 — although it was not clear if that employee had access to children.
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