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Maryland’s own audit has ripped the veil off a foster care system that was supposed to protect the most vulnerable children but instead exposed them to grave danger. The Office of Legislative Audits found that kids in state custody were placed in homes tied to registered sex offenders and that one vendor employed a person with a murder conviction to provide direct care — a gutting betrayal of public trust.
The report also details how bureaucrats resorted to housing children in hotel rooms rather than safe foster homes, with 280 children placed in hotels between 2020 and 2024 and dozens kept there for months or even years. Taxpayers paid outrageously high daily rates for one-on-one “supervision” by vendors who were often unlicensed, costing millions while oversight failed.
At the center of the mess are basic failures any parent would expect a government agency to perform: criminal background checks and follow-up reviews were cursory or missing. Auditors specifically found seven registered sex offenders listed at addresses that had been approved as guardianship homes, and an employee convicted of sexual assault of a minor was later charged with crimes involving children in his care.
The audit shows a pattern of chronic neglect beyond safety checks — hundreds of children missed required medical and dental exams, thousands of abuse and neglect allegations were delayed or not investigated within required timeframes, and the agency failed to recover millions in overpayments. This is not a one-off oversight; auditors say longstanding problems remain unresolved, and the administration again received an “unsatisfactory” accountability rating.
Lawmakers from both parties have rightly expressed outrage and are demanding hearings, while state officials claim they have been working to reduce hotel placements and address problems. That spin rings hollow to any parent who learns that children were placed with registered predators or monitored by a convicted killer — the rhetoric of “we’re fixing it” cannot replace immediate accountability and prosecutions where negligence rises to criminality.
This report is a damning indictment of a culture that values bureaucratic box-checking over real child safety, and conservatives should lead the charge for truth, not cover-ups. We must call for firings, criminal investigations where warranted, and a return to common-sense standards: rigorous background checks, real licensing for caregivers, and swift, transparent audits that don’t let political appointees sweep failures under the rug.
If Maryland won’t protect these kids, then lawmakers must act — cut off contracts to unlicensed vendors, require local accountability, empower relatives and faith-based foster families, and restore parental and community oversight. Hardworking Americans expect their tax dollars to secure children’s safety, not bankroll a broken system that abandons them to harm.
