A bill sponsored by a Lewiston legislator and championed by a local mother aimed at increasing transparency of school employee misconduct is now law.

The Legislature passed LD 2192 in a near-unanimous vote, and the emergency measure immediately became law.

Cara Courchesne brought the idea for the bill to Sen. Margaret Rotundo, D-Lewiston, after she walked into her daughter’s local elementary school this past fall and saw a man working there she says sexually harassed her 20 years earlier. A Google search showed that he recently resigned from another school district after facing sexual assault allegations.

The law outlines steps for school districts to take if an employee is accused of misconduct.

The bill, as proposed, would have required applicants for school positions in Maine to disclose all investigations they were subject to under previous employers, as well as by state licensing agencies, law enforcement and the Department of Health and Human Services, for a host of potential misconduct. The information would stay between employers.

However, the requirement was taken out of the final version over concerns about false reports.

Under the law, officials can ask an applicant’s previous employer about an investigation, but only if the investigation resulted in a founded claim.

Focusing on false reports instead of all the harm that goes underreported is not how the problem will be solved, Courchesne said.

“I’m disgusted but not surprised that the focus turned almost entirely to false accusations,” she said. “Sexual misconduct is already vastly underreported, in part because victims are terrified they won’t be believed.”

Inconsistent hiring practices can leave dangerous gaps, allowing individuals accused of misconduct to move among districts undetected. If schools care about student safety, they should be asking about misconduct that would not show up on a background check, Courchesne said.

“We don’t design fire codes around false alarms, we design them around real fires. False alarms matter, but they’re not the thing burning buildings down,” she said.

The approved process for school employee investigations under the new law is as follows:

• School officials must check with the Department of Education for an applicant’s certification status and whether there are any investigation findings when hiring.
• When a complaint is made against an employee, schools are required to put the subject of the investigation on paid leave. 
• Investigations must be completed once started, even if the employee resigns.
• Superintendents are required to notify the Department of Education of the final outcome.
• The notification of an investigation will be available to other superintendents and approved school administrators to see on the employee’s file. If there are no findings, it will be deleted.

Regardless of the law’s final language, the effort was worthwhile in bringing attention to an important issue, Courchesne said.

It first updates the definition of covered employee investigations to include sexual exploitation of a child, sexual assault, sexual harassment, stalking and staff-on-staff misconduct. 

The bill also establishes a group appointed by the Department of Education to look into investigation practices related to employee misconduct and, based on the findings, the group can propose new legislation in 2027.

Rotundo, too, is proud of the progress made and attention to the matter, but said she agrees that there is more work ahead and that everyone shares a responsibility to ensure schools are safe places.

“I’m hopeful that the working group created by my legislation and the next legislature will work together to continue to close the remaining loopholes that allow people who harm children to move between districts undetected,” Rotundo said in a statement.