Cassandra Sanchez focused on business as usual.

She hoped to add two positions to the Office of the Child Advocate and increase their general funds to travel to residential facilities, in her request to the Senate Finance Committee, which oversees the next phase of the state budget process.

Sen. James Gray, a Rochester Republican and chair of the finance committee, addressed the elephant in the room.

“In the House budget you are…?”

“In the House budget we have been eliminated completely as an office,” said Sanchez, the state’s child advocate.

The House voted to eliminate the Office of the Child Advocate, in part of sweeping cuts to several positions and boards like the Housing Appeals Board and the Council on the Arts. The fate of Sanchez’ position, and that of the eight other employees in the only oversight agency for children in the state, now hangs in the hands of the Senate.

In front of the Senate Finance Committee, Sanchez stuck to her initial script, though. Rather than plea to spare her office, she told lawmakers that caseloads were high and two additional positions would help.

“This is the highest our caseloads have been since my time in the office and they continue to grow as well,” she said.

She made the same pitch to House lawmakers earlier this year, where the message was clear: In a tight revenue year, additions would not be granted.

She didn’t expect the committee to eliminate her office in its entirety, though.

In House committee finance hearings, Rep. Dan McGuire, an Epsom Republican, initially stated that eliminating the child advocate position was a cost-saving metric that would spare the state $2 million over the next two years. He also said he was tasked with cutting $200 million from the budget overall.

However, as the vote came to the House floor, McGuire suggested that the move may be politically motivated as well, stating that Sanchez has “interfered” with legislation in the State House and reform would be better coming from within the Division of Children, Youth and Families leadership.

Last year, Jeff Fleischer resigned as the Director of DCYF several months after accepting the position. He came out of retirement to lead the division with a background in the nonprofit sphere, leading the Youth Advocate Program which looked at community-based alternatives to incarceration and residential placements for children.

Interim director Marie Noonan was later tapped to lead the agency full-time.

The state has a troubled, storied history of abuse in youth facilities. Over a thousand people have sued the state alleging abuse at the Youth Detention Center, the only state-run jail for children now known as the Sununu Youth Services Center.

The Office of the Child Advocate was also created in the wake of turmoil, with a number of high-profile deaths of children in state care leading lawmakers, including Senate President Sharon Carson, to push for more oversight.

Since its creation, the office has visited children regularly at the Sununu Youth Services Center, Hampstead Hospital and residential treatment facilities, in addition to conducting case reviews of children fatalities, restraint and seclusion reports and responding to complaints and inquiries.

On average, 350 New Hampshire children are sent away to residential facilities, according to a Monitor analysis, with placements as far as Florida, Arkansas and Oklahoma. In 2023, Sanchez visited two boys at a program in Tennessee, calling for their immediate return to the Granite State – and an end to all out-of-state placements – after her visit.

Although the Department of Health and Human Services has a stated goal to reduce the number of residential placements for children by 2026, a handful of youth are still sent to programs across the country.

Sanchez was appointed the state’s second child advocate in 2022, after Moira O’Neill, the inaugural director, did not seek a second reappointment after her four-year term. Sanchez is due to be reappointed in 2026.

The Senate Finance Committee members gave no insight on the fate of Sanchez’ position, or their thoughts on her requests, in a short hearing. Her presentation, coupled with questions, lasted less than 10 minutes.

Gov. Kelly Ayotte included the office in her version of the budget and has indicated she plans to work with Carson and the Senate to see it restored.