Obama administration officials are releasing long-anticipated regulations designed to protect unaccompanied children in the government’s shelter network from sexual abuse.

Officials with the Office of Refugee Resettlement published an interim rule in the Federal Register on Wednesday that includes a bevy of protections for children caught in the country illegally and alone- including creating avenues to anonymously report abuses, strengthening procedures for handling allegations and requiring better training for staff members.

ORR has faced mounting pressure to comply with the Prison Rape Elimination Act, which requires strict standards for preventing and punishing abuses. Congress ordered ORR to write PREA regulations in March 2013, but they remained tied up in executive review for nearly a year.

Officials wrote that the regulations would be effective as of Wednesday – waiving a step in the standard process – because delay “would be contrary to the public interest.”

The provisions are expected to be finalized following a 60-day period for public comment. Shelters will have until June to comply, though the agency is urging them to implement the protections as soon as possible.

Chris Daley, an attorney and deputy executive director with Just Detention International, said the new, 143-page rule book offers “a strong foundation for protecting kids in ORR care.”

“The question will come down to whether ORR sets up the monitoring system and the oversight system it needs to make them effective,” he said.

ORR has been overwhelmed by record numbers of children coming to the U.S. from Central America. Last fiscal year, ORR cared for 57,496 unaccompanied children, more than double from the previous year. The agency’s network has swelled from about 50 shelters five years ago to 125, prompting alarm among child advocates who have warned that ORR’s oversight is stretched.

Chronicle investigation

A Houston Chronicle investigation published earlier this year found children in ORR custody were molested as they slept, sexually harassed and seduced by staff members over the past five years, according to federal reports, state child-care licensing violations, and police and court records. ORR relied on state licensing authorities and local police to investigate abuse, instead of notifying the FBI of serious allegations, the Chronicle found.

Criminal cases crumbled because of sloppy detective work, communication gaps with federal officials and jurisdictional confusion.

No shelter worker was prosecuted during those five years under a 2008 federal provision that made sexual contact with a detainee in ORR’s care a felony, the Chronicle found.

After the Chronicle’s investigation, lawmakers and nearly 80 advocacy organizations signed letters to federal officials urging them to finalize the regulations quickly.

Zero tolerance

ORR spokesman Kenneth Wolfe said this summer that the agency would report sexual abuse allegations involving possible violations of federal law to the FBI and was formalizing a memorandum of agreement with the Department of Justice. Wolfe said officials are still working on that agreement.

U.S. Sen. Dianne Feinstein, D-Calif., said the government has a responsibility to ensure the children are treated with respect and dignity.

“The administration’s new zero-tolerance policies are a giant step forward to protect these incredibly vulnerable children,” she said.

Earlier this year, some senators asked the Government Accountability Office to review ORR’s oversight of its shelter network, including spending on unaccompanied children, which totaled $912 million last year.

Advocates have lobbied for years for ORR to strengthen protections for those children.

“The after-effects of traumas they have experienced, coupled with fear of their circumstances and of the adults in charge, leave them extremely vulnerable to sexual abuse by adult caretakers and also by predatory youth,” a PREA report warned in 2009.

Chris Rickerd, policy counsel at the ACLU in Washington, D.C., said the new regulations adopt some best practices for preventing abuses in confinement.

“There are a lot of positives in it,” he said, including addressing pat-down searches, background checks before hiring and strengthening training for staff.

Rickerd said he was disappointed to see that the agency did not extend the protections to children ORR places in foster homes. “That stands out as a pretty big gap,” he said. In its regulations, ORR notes that children in foster care go to public schools and regularly interact with adults outside their homes, which are all required to be state-licensed.

Holiday timing

Brenda V. Smith, an American University law professor appointed to the bipartisan PREA commission, said she was pleased that ORR delivered regulations but questioned the decision to release them around the holidays and delay the public comment period until after the release.

“It’s critical that these regulations come out because of what is happening with the border and with the complaints that we are already hearing about abuse of youth in immigration detention facilities,” Smith said. ” I wish, however, (that) there had been a process where individuals and groups that had been working on these issues … had an opportunity to weigh in on them.”

ORR will have a new director next year. Eskinder Negash, who has presided over the agency for six years, said this month that he was stepping down but did not explain why.