Addressing challenges at the intersection of early intervention and child welfare.

Background: The Keep Children and Families Safe Act amendment to the Child Abuse Prevention and Treatment Act (CAPTA) of 2003 mandated children under age three who are involved with Child Welfare (CW) to receive a referral to the system for early intervention (EI). While there is strong rationale for providing developmental services to young children and families impacted by maltreatment, the early implementation of this policy brought about many challenges related to interagency coordination and readiness of providers to provide cross-systems care. Currently, as the system and providers within the system recover from the effects of Covid-19, a predicted increase in need of services may exacerbate historical gaps in the provision of services to families involved with CW.