Nearly two months have passed since the Nelson County Board of Supervisors voted 3 to 1 to transfer authority over the Department of Social Services from an advisory board to Nelson Administrator Candy McGarry.
Prior to that action, there were growing calls that department had failed to act on referrals of child abuse and neglect. A few more details are available in the September 9, 2025 edition of this newsletter.
The packet for the Nelson County Board of Supervisors meeting for October 14 has data from September after a corrective action plan was put in place.
There were 18 referrals to the department and 13 of them were validated, or 72 percent. Five were screened out, or 28 percent. Of the validated results, four went forward to the investigation phase and eight were sent to family assessments.
In fiscal year 2024, 26 percent of cases were validated and 74 percent were screened out. There were no investigations ordered that year prompting concerns from both Nelson County Mark Embry and Commonwealth’s Attorney Daniel Rutherford.
Recruitment is underway for a new social services director as well as members of a new advisory board.
Before you go: The time to write and conduct research for this article is covered by paid subscribers to Charlottesville Community Engagement. In fact, this particular installment comes from the October 13, 2025 edition of the program. To ensure this research can be sustained, please consider becoming a paid subscriber or contributing monthly through Patreon.
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