North Carolina Gov. Josh Stein on Thursday signed into law sweeping foster-care reforms aimed at giving the state more oversight of North Carolina's foster care system. 

House Bill 612, a bipartisan bill that sponsors titled the Fostering Care in NC Act, has been in the works for years. It gives the state Department of Health and Human Services more power to hold county-run social services departments accountable. The bill also aims to tighten procedures and deadlines for investigating reports of abuse and neglect within the foster care system.

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Stein signed the bill in front of families, advocates and bill supporters, including social workers and elected officials. 

"This is a huge step in moving us forward and making sure the children who didn't ask for the trauma or neglect they've been exposed to have a good shot at being happy, successful adults," Senate Democratic leader Sydney Batch, D-Wake, said Thursday. "We have seen children dying in care based on decisions that were made at the county level. This allows the Department of Health and Human Services to engage in an earlier stage and hopefully save children from being physically abused."

Batch credited WRAL's documentary "Broken: Foster Care in North Carolina," with helping to give the bill more momentum this year. The documentary examined failures in the state's foster care system.

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"We were able to use that as momentum to get my Republican colleagues to really move on this issue," Batch said.

The bill was supported by leaders on both sides of the aisle, including bill co-sponsor Rep. Allen Chesser, R-Nash, who has said the state needs more oversight of North Carolina’s foster care system.

"A bill of this magnitude doesn't just happen," Stein said during the bill-signing ceremony. "It's a lot of people of good faith coming together working hard to try to do something right for the children of North Carolina. 

Stein praised bipartisan efforts to push through legislation that “protects the most vulnerable children and strengthens our child welfare system."

"I want to thank the General Assembly for coming together on a bipartisan basis to do what is right by the children of North Carolina,” Stein said. “I think that's something the people of North Carolina are thrilled to see in these divided times."

The state recently announced the official launch of Path NC, a statewide digital system for social workers to track foster children as they are relocated.

The program is intended to unify the state's disjointed child welfare databases to create a real-time system that child-welfare officials can access throughout the state “so that it doesn't matter which county the child is in, the social worker will know what the child best needs," Stein said.

In addition to the foster-care bill, Stein signed Senate Bill 400, which promotes a multiagency approach to prevent abuse, neglect and exploitation of disabled or older adults. “This bill will help counties improve their adult protective services for older and disabled North Carolinians by creating teams that can share information and collaborate, making vulnerable people safer,” Stein said in a statement later Thursday. 

Stein also signed a series of other bills Thursday, including:

  • House Bill 373, which would allow UNC System schools to offer tuition discounts to qualifying military students, as well as to certain students enrolled in approved employer-sponsored financial support programs.  “This bill will help military students afford tuition at our state’s top-tier university system,” Stein said in a statement. “This way, we can both support those who have sacrificed so much for our freedoms and strengthen our workforce of tomorrow.”
    • House Bill 251, which prohibits state agencies from denying disaster recovery assistance to citizens or qualified immigrants on the basis of political affiliation or political speech. “North Carolina does not discriminate based on political affiliation or political speech, including when providing disaster recovery assistance,” Stein said in a statement. “This bill ensures that will remain the case.” 
      • House Bill 247, which aims to increase regulations to make excavations safer for underground utilities.

        WRAL anchor/reporter Chris Lovingood contributed to this report.