PDP lawmakers call for gov’t action on child abuse ‘social crisis’
- The San Juan Daily Star
- 7 hours ago
- 2 min read
By THE STAR STAFF
Popular Democratic Party (PDP) Reps. Estrella Martínez Soto (District 27, Juana Díaz, Coamo, Santa Isabel and Aibonito) and Sol Higgins Cuadrado (District 35, Humacao, Naguabo and Las Piedras), along with PDP at-large Sen. Ada Álvarez Conde, called on Gov. Jenniffer González Colón and Family Secretary Suzanne Roig Fuertes on Monday to stop denying what the opposition lawmakers said is a social crisis of child abuse in Puerto Rico.
Álvarez Conde pointed out that “laws protecting minors exist, but minors, in particular, remain at risk.”
“During the last four-year term, former Governor Pierluisi approved Joint Resolution 1 of 2023, which addressed the child abuse crisis in Puerto Rico. However, despite the existence of the law, if it is not enforced, the result is what we see daily: cases of children severely abused, sexually exploited, and mistreated at all levels,” denounced the senator, who is also a chaplain.
Higgins Cuadrado, who chaired the House Health Committee during the previous four-year term, stated that just as with the executive order on the gender violence emergency, “this administration thrives on denial and tries to hide problems with sensationalism.”
“On that occasion, the resolution by former Popular Democratic Party senator and social worker Elizabeth Rosa Vélez ordered the Departments of Family, Education, and Health, the Mental Health and Addiction Administration, and the Puerto Rico Police Bureau to establish emergency plans, educational campaigns, and mechanisms for the prevention and follow-up of cases of child abuse and neglect,” Higgins Cuadrado said. “That wasn’t done. Now we are seeing this sad reality.”
Martínez Soto asserted that “with each case that comes to the attention of the Puerto Rican press, it is a reminder that the laws are being violated.”
“It is up to all of us as a country to provide the real, immediate, and constant protection that minors need,” she said. “But this administration has to do its part, and the numbers that Suzanne Roig presents [...] clash with those published by the Puerto Rico Institute of Statistics. Our call, as legislators, to Governor Jenniffer González Colón is for her to instruct her secretaries and agency heads to comply with the laws in the face of the social crisis we are all witnessing.”
During the press conference, it was also noted that Roig Fuertes recently reported that the agency is investigating some 5,800 referrals of child abuse cases. Of those, 5,000 allegedly correspond to accumulated delays from 2017 to 2025. “Something is amiss with the New Progressive Party governments and their handling of social issues,” Martínez Soto said. “We recall that when Yanitsia Irizarry was [family] secretary …, 42,000 reports of child abuse and sexual abuse were filed away.”
Irizarry served as family secretary from 2009 to 2012, in the administration of then-Gov. Luis Fortuño.