PHOENIX — A House panel adopted a series of sweeping changes in how Child Protective Services operates designed to give caseworkers more tools to shield children from harm as well as open the agency and at least some of its investigations to more public scrutiny.

 The measures approved with only limited dissent by the House Government Committee include:

 - Opening up the records of investigations when a child is murdered or nearly killed because of abuse or neglect;

 - Requiring open court hearings in cases where the state wants to take away someone’s child unless there is good reason to close them;

 - Allowing anyone to get the disciplinary records of every state employee;

 - Mandating that CPS workers inform police when a child is believed to be missing and at risk of harm;

 - Forcing CPS workers to promptly obtain copies of existing court orders on child custody and abide by them;

 - Altering how CPS deals with allegations of criminal conduct and works with law enforcement and prosecutors.

 Rep. Jonathan Paton, R-Tucson, who crafted several of the measures, said the state agency has been allowed to operate for a long period of time without adequate scrutiny from either the Legislature or the public.

 Paton said lawmakers cannot micromanage every agency. “But we believe that public scrutiny at the end of the day gives us that ability,’’ he said.

 The measures are a direct outgrowth of a series of legislative hearings following the deaths of several children who safety was supposed to be being protected, or at least monitored, by CPS.

 Rep. Kirk Adams, R-Phoenix, who chairs the committee, said those hearings showed how little information is available on how the agency operates.

 But Adams said the hearings also found other problems. For example, in one of the cases CPS actually gave two children to their father, apparently unaware that there was a court order not only denying him custody but prohibiting him from having contact. The children ended up dead and the father has been charged.

 Adams said CPS would have known that had someone bothered to check court orders. HB 2594 not only requires caseworkers to make a “good faith’’ effort to find such orders but also to ask the custodial parent if any judge has imposed restrictions on who can have the children.

 HB 2599 goes to the separate problem of missing children. Adams cited another case where a mother under CPS investigation disappeared with her child.

 He said a sheriff’s deputy came into contact with the woman and the child, asked her some questions about the boy’s injury but was told he had fallen into some cactus. The deputy, unaware CPS was looking for them, left.

 The boy later turned up dead. This measure requires CPS to notify law enforcement when a child is missing and enter that information into state and national databases.

 But much of the discussion centered around measures dealing with what the public can learn about investigations.

 The broadest would require CPS to release all of its records in cases of fatalities or near fatalities to anyone who requests them.

 HB 2454 does allow the agency or a county attorney to seek to withhold all or part of the records. But that requires a showing that disclosure would cause “specific material harm’’ to an ongoing investigation.

 A related measure, HB 2453, would require open court hearings in cases where CPS seeks to take temporary or permanent custody of a child. Now, such hearings are presumed closed on the premise that public scrutiny would harm the children involved.

 Flora Jessup, who has lobbied on behalf of children in the polygamous community of Colorado City, said her own experience proves that logic is wrong. Jessup said there was no secret she was abused as a child while growing up there. “The secrecy is protecting the people who are abusing these children,’’ she told lawmakers. “It’s not protecting the children, it’s not protecting the family,’’ Jessup continued. “It’s protecting the predators.’’

 But this measure won’t help: While court hearings would be open, those in attendance could not disclose elsewhere the identity of anyone involved.

 “It’s a first step,’’ said Paton, saying he would consider a broader bill — with no restrictions against disclosure — if this measure works out.

 HB 2159 which would open up state employee discipline records is designed to get around existing state regulations that limit what information can be provided about workers. Paton said making those records public will help Arizonans figure out what happens to CPS workers whose actions or inactions result in the death of a child.

 Rep. Steve Farley, D-Tucson, refused to support several of the measures saying he was concerned about possible unintended consequences of the wording. But Farley also said he fears some people may believe that changing the system will end all child abuse in Arizona. “I wish it were that easy,’’ he said. Farley said lawmakers need to deal with the underlying causes, including substance abuse and mental illness. All the measures now go to the full House.