Computer program aimed at predicting child abuse debated

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YORK, Pa. — When a 4-year-old girl drowned in her swimming pool near Pittsburgh on an August day in 2019, the family was already known to child welfare. This is the horror story of child welfare, where the red flags were raised to see a child was in danger, but they were missed, screened out by the person taking the call and put into the “unfounded” pile. Erin Dalton, director of Allegheny County’s Department of Human Services, and her predecessor set about changing that six years ago with an algorithm, or predictive analysis tool, to help screen those critical calls. It has its critics, but Dalton remains the algorithm’s biggest cheerleader.