Officials with the Department for Children and Families at a legislative meeting. Photo by Peter D’Auria/VTDiggerTop officials at the Department for Children and Families acknowledged the existence of an internal calendar used to monitor Vermonters’ pregnancies, confirming an allegation made in a striking lawsuit filed by the Vermont ACLU in January.  The document, DCF Family Services Division Deputy Commissioner Aryka Radke said in a meeting of Vermont’s Legislative Women’s Caucus Thursday, is a Microsoft Outlook calendar that includes the initials, an identifying number and the expected due date of certain pregnant women.The calendar also includes cases involving individuals who are scheduled to be released from prison, in which “maybe we should be reaching out to the family to discuss some type of safety plan,” Radke said. The admission sheds light on a secretive and little-known function of the state Department for Children and Families, one that top officials said helps protect newborns from potential abuse or danger. “I can imagine the criticism we would receive if we had information about a very dangerous situation, potentially dangerous situation, that a child was about to be born into, and we said we should do nothing until that child is born,” Chris Winters, the department’s commissioner, said at the meeting.Generally, people can be placed on the calendar when someone contacts the department with concerns that a parent-to-be has substance use disorder or lacks the ability to properly care for a child, state officials said Thursday. Staff then add the information to the calendar and, 30 days before the infant’s due date, examine the case to see if there are real concerns for the safety of the newborn-to-be, department administrators said.Radke said in a brief interview Thursday that people may land on the calendar without their knowledge, and only find out once the department reaches out to conduct an assessment a month before their due date.READ MORE Vermont ACLU claims state conducts ‘surveillance and brazen intervention’ into Vermonters’ pregnancies by Peter D'Auria January 16, 2025, 9:13 amJanuary 20, 2025, 12:52 pm “Because what if it turns out, once we actually do the investigation, there’s no issue?” she said. “Then why give you that additional stress?” Officials declined to speak to the specific allegations raised in the lawsuit. Nor did they say how many people were on the department’s calendar, or exactly who within the state has access to it, although Radke said that only a small handful of people can see the full docket.It’s also not clear how long the calendar has been in use. But the calendar has surfaced publicly in at least one other place: an article, published in the Vermont Bar Journal in 2016, examining legal issues around newborns who are dependent on opioids. Chris Winters, the commissioner of the Department for Children and Families. Photo by Peter D’Auria/VTDiggerIn that article, Nancy Corsones, a now-retired Superior Court judge, discussed how Vermont’s Department for Children and Families handled cases involving pregnant women with substance use disorder.“The tracking of these pre-partum cases is accomplished by something called the DCF pregnancy calendar, which is essentially a central inventory of high risk pregnant women upon whom DCF has received reports of drug use, so they may schedule the initiation of an assessment or investigation as the woman enters her ninth month of pregnancy,” the article reads.Corsones could not be reached for comment. An attorney at Corsones’ former law firm said the ex-judge was now retired and currently on vacation.  The calendar was first widely publicized in the January lawsuit filed by the Vermont ACLU, the nonprofit legal firm Pregnancy Justice and other attorneys on behalf of a mother identified as A.V.The calendar is used by the department to “target and track pregnant Vermonters it deems supposedly unsuitable for parenthood,” according to the lawsuit. With the aid of that calendar, officials intervened even before A.V. gave birth to secure custody of her child, the lawsuit said, ensuing in a harrowing and traumatic legal battle.The use of that calendar, the lawsuit alleged, violates multiple Vermont laws and provisions of the state constitution — including the 2022 amendment guaranteeing the right to reproductive autonomy.But earlier this week, David Groff, an assistant attorney general, asked a judge to dismiss the lawsuit, saying the state acted within the bounds of the law.Groff wrote that “despite Plaintiff’s disagreement with the actions of DCF, it is undisputed that those actions were overseen by the appropriate judicial process.”Read the story on VTDigger here: Department for Children and Families acknowledges using calendar to monitor some pregnant Vermonters. ...read more read less