BAKERSFIELD, Calif. – Kern County supervisors on Tuesday unanimously agreed to launch an investigation into the county’s child protective services (CPS) agency. The resolution follows the gruesome death of 8-year-old Genesis Mata earlier this month, which her family says could have been prevented if CPS had taken action earlier.
Tuesday’s Board of Supervisors meeting included nearly an hour of public comment about CPS. Many residents claimed the agency failed to act on abuse, while others claimed it wrongly tore children away from safe families.
Frank Madrid said more abused children are in need of services.
“Look out for these kids, please,” he pleaded to the supervisors. “There's people out there, young children, that need our help.”
Others, including Daisy Gomez, lamented that this conversation was prompted by Mata’s death.
“She didn't have to pass for us to be here,” she said.
Mata was found in early August in a bathtub in an otherwise empty room at a Bakersfield La Quinta Inn. According to local reports, her body was found with burns and other injuries across her body. Her father and stepmother have been charged with murder and child abuse.
CPS has come under the spotlight because Mata’s family claims they’d called CPS multiple times in the years leading up to her death.
The county can’t comment on Mata’s case specifically.
Pressure mounted on the county after an online petition to investigate CPS received more than 5,000 signatures. Lito Morilla, Director of the Kern County’s Department of Human Services, later proposed the resolution that supervisors approved on Tuesday.
“Obviously it's not a perfect system, but there are very good people that work at CPS and I don't want to paint them with a broad brush,” said Supervisor David Couch. “I have to have confidence that they're going to get to the bottom of this.”
Supervisors agreed to find an outside contractor to conduct the investigation.
“We will pursue justice at the judicial level, the criminal level, and what we control here, the administrative level,” said supervisor Jeff Flores. “Those bureaucratic processes, if we can improve them, will save lives and hopefully avoid this kind of pain.”
