Safe Haven Baby Box hotline number to be displayed in Kentucky high schools

By Tessa Redmond
Kentucky Today

Kentucky Right to Life, a pro-life organization on the frontlines of efforts to install Safe Haven Baby Boxes across the state, announced Thursday that posters displaying a hotline number for mothers in crisis will be posted in Kentucky high schools.

House Bill 272 — legislation that requires the hotline number be displayed in public schools — passed through the 2024 Kentucky General Assembly with unanimous approval from both the House and Senate.

“The legislature has believed that these issues are so critical that … crisis numbers should be posted in the schools. Suicide prevention, human trafficking, child abuse hotlines — they are now present, and now infant abandonment posters will be at every high school in the Commonwealth of Kentucky,” said Addia Wuchner, executive director of Kentucky Right to Life.

“We don’t know what this 1-800 number presence will do in the schools, but when a young girl finds herself possibly in crisis, or a young couple, reaching out to that line may make the difference for them and for the life of their child.”

Safe Haven boxes are often placed in police, emergency medical or fire stations. After placing her baby in the climate-controlled, electronically monitored box and closing the door, a mother who uses the box is free to leave as it automatically locks and triggers a series of silent alarms. An individual with emergency medical training is then able to respond within minutes and take custody of the infant for ongoing care.

Rep. Nancy Tate, who chairs the pro-life caucus, noted there are 257 of these boxes across the nation and 39 currently in the state.

“Our goal is to have at least one box in each of the 120 counties, and more in the larger counties,” she added, “which will bring us up to the House Bill 155 number,” a 2021 piece of legislation that first allowed Safe Haven boxes in Kentucky.

“Nationwide, there have been 50 babies that have been saved with Safe Haven Baby Boxes, and four of those have been saved in the Commonwealth,” Tate said.

Two of those infants were surrendered in Bowling Green.

“These mothers are heroes,” Wuchner noted earlier. “They don’t abandon their child in these boxes, but they surrender them because they know at that moment of crisis in their lives, they’re not able, for whatever reason—and there’s no blame and no shame—to continue on with their motherhood. And they want something more for their child. They are brave. They are courageous.”

According to Rep. Jason Nemes, the passage and implementation of HB 272 was a part of the overall effort to support life in Kentucky, but there’s more.

“Life isn’t just about stopping abortion. It is there, to be sure, but it’s also about making sure that our mothers and our fathers know that they have other choices and that they have supports around them. It’s about supporting foster care. It’s about supporting adoptions. It’s about making sure that our families are strong enough that they can raise healthy babies. And if they believe they’re not, then the communities surround them, and we assist them in doing that,” Nemes said.

“We’ve done a lot in Kentucky to save life. But my goodness, we’ve got a lot left to do,” he added.

Kentucky Right to Life provides the first $1,000 for communities raising funds for a baby box, which cost upward of $16,000. More are springing up across the state, including in Boone County, where a fire station is being built to include a Safe Haven box. Breckenridge and Pike Counties will also both see boxes open in September.

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