Family advocates are hoping a new law will help alleviate the disproportionate number of child welfare investigations opened into low-income Black and Latino families.

Gov. Kathy Hochul signed legislation in late December barring the state from accepting anonymous complaints to its child abuse hotline, which is used to trigger investigations by local agencies.

Instead, the new law “requires” those making abuse allegations to leave their name and contact information, and prohibits the office of children and family services from releasing information identifying the person making the report.

Proponents of the change said it should curtail unnecessary investigations that can be disruptive for both children and their parents, and which disproportionately target Black and Latino families.

“One call can trigger this massive investigation against the family,” said Washcarina Martinez Alonzo, a senior staff attorney with Legal Services NYC, a group that offers free representation to low-income New Yorkers.

She said the system allowed bad landlords, neighbors, family members or abusers to make false complaints anonymously and weaponize the system to settle grievances. The city is legally bound to investigate all reports made to the state hotline.

"That's a fancy tool for abusers to use to continue to exert control,” Martinez Alonzo said. “It's highly probative. They look into your home, they check your refrigerator, they check your windows, they go to your neighbors, they go to the school. That all happens from just that one call.”

A report published last year in the Columbia Journal of Race and Law said about 4 in 10 of New York City’s Black and Latino children will be investigated by child protective services by the time they turn 18. That report found 7% of anonymous calls are substantiated, compared to 24% of calls made by social services professionals or medical workers.

Proponents of the measure included the state Bar Association, which called anonymous reporting a flawed policy.

But critics of the policy said there are instances where people call in with legitimate complaints but do not want to leave their names. In cases where a person insists on not leaving a name, a supervisor will intervene and tell the caller they can contact community-based services or the state’s hotline assisting families with resources known as HEARS. The caller will also be informed that the law prohibits them from reporting false allegations.

“One anonymous call changed the course of my life. While my family survived the experience, it revealed the devastating power this system holds over so many others,” Shalonda Curtis-Hackett, a community outreach coordinator and policy associate at Neighborhood Defender Service of Harlem, said in a statement.

“Every day, I work with families who live in fear of that knock on the door. We won’t stop until every family in this state can sleep more peacefully, knowing that one part of this harmful system is no longer allowed to operate unchecked.”

New York will join Texas and California, which also ban anonymous reporting. The law takes effect this summer.