(The Center Square) – The Georgia Department of Human Services, which oversees the state’s child welfare agency, paid more than $950,000 for just one Chevrolet Traverse. But most of the cost apparently is for sophisticated spying equipment that will be used by a unit tasked with rescuing sex-trafficked foster teens, an investigation by The Center Square found.
The purchase, however, raises questions about whether the department’s equipment could violate constitutional rights and its authority as a child protection service.
The 2026 model SUV came with base trim and front-wheel drive, costing $38,700, records show.
Asked why taxpayers wound up spending more than 24 times that, Human Services Chief of Staff Chris Apsey would not explain, saying “we had equipment bolted onto it as part of the procurement.” He would not elaborate on what equipment cost another $890,500, plus an installation cost of $25,400.
However, other state records, obtained through the Georgia Open Records Act, point to a cell-site simulator, a powerful surveillance device used by law enforcement that mimics a cell phone tower to track and tap into cell phones remotely.
The Center Square reported last month how the department spent $639,000 on four other police-grade technologies that surveil web activity, extract the contents of cell phones and track cell phone locations. The prospect of the department spending nearly $1 million more on yet another surveillance tool—one that’s mobile and far more invasive—has lawmakers raising Fourth Amendment concerns, the constitutional protection against unreasonable search and seizure.
“They are not a law enforcement agency, and my understanding is that that type of equipment is only supposed to go to law enforcement agencies,” state Rep. Beth Camp, R-Concord, told The Center Square after the news wire informed her of the spending. “That is surveillance. That is spy surveillance.”
Camp, who chairs the House Judiciary Juvenile Committee, has been sparring with Human Services for months trying to obtain records of spending associated with the department’s Special Victims Unit—a team set up by human services department Commissioner Candice Broce to work with law enforcement to track down runaway foster children in danger of being sex trafficked.
“And this comes to light through an investigative means, your team, and we’re just finding out about this,” Camp said, referring to The Center Square obtaining records of the purchase. “I feel a little duped.”
Legally justified?
Apsey, the chief of staff, did tell The Center Square that the equipment bolted onto the Traverse is for the Special Victims Unit. Asked why he can’t explain what that is, he said, “The comparison I’d use is, if you were covering the federal beat, would you expect the (Department of Defense) to talk about classified operations in that sense? And it’s not a one-to-one comparison, obviously, but that’s kind of the framing that I’d use.”
Human Services’ SVU team has been a source of contention over the past year, with some lawmakers questioning whether the social services agency has authority under state law to perform police-like investigative functions that may require search warrants.
The Georgia Bureau of Investigation, a statewide police agency, has at least two cell-site simulators. Spokeswoman Sara Lue told The Center Square using them typically requires a search warrant or a court order.
Camp said there aren’t similar safeguards for Human Services.
“They are not beholden to the same standard of a law enforcement agency that is going to have probable cause (to) bring that before a judge, who would then make a determination if there is a reason to get a warrant to surveil someone for potential illegal activity,” Camp said. “There’s not a safeguard in place for citizens to make sure they’re not illegally surveilled.”
Last year, the General Assembly’s Office of Legislative Counsel gave a written legal opinion to state Rep. Mary Margaret Oliver, D-Decatur, that raised doubts about whether child welfare can take on such duties as “executing exigency warrants for IP addresses, social media handles, and electronic devices; pinging cell phones; and conducting forensic interviews.”
The legal opinion, obtained by The Center Square, said “we have found no express statutory authorization for DFCS to exercise police powers,” but cautioned that the department could find justification in other legal language.
Broce has declined interview requests, but in a written statement provided to The Center Square after it published the earlier story on surveillance tools, her department responded to criticisms of overreach by stressing that SVU works in tandem with law enforcement.
The statement said SVU has recovered, or helped recover, almost 200 missing children over the past two years.
“There are several state laws operating together to give the agency authority to use these tools and staff to find missing children, the majority of whom are in the State’s custody as foster youth,” the statement emailed by department spokeswoman Kylie Winton said. “Primarily, those laws deal with the agency’s duties to protect vulnerable children from abuse and exploitation, provide services to keep families safely intact if possible, mandates to collaborate with law enforcement, work CPS investigations, and act as the legal parent for children in foster care.”
It’s still not clear if Human Services is obtaining search warrants to use its surveillance tools, or relying on other law enforcement agencies for them.
Answers to follow-up questions from The Center Square, which Winton said were largely written by the commissioner, said, “Search warrants can be necessary, and those are certainly pursued by partner law enforcement. It is my preference that (Human Services) officers not directly apply for search warrants.”
The department’s statements did not mention a cell-site simulator—a highly advanced targeting surveillance device that impersonates cell phone towers to trick phones into connecting.
An operator of one can pinpoint phone locations, downgrade their connections to 2G, and potentially listen in on calls and intercept texts, according to Cooper Quintin, a security researcher and technologist with the Electronic Frontier Foundation, a San Francisco-based nonprofit concerned with civil liberties and privacy in the digital world.
“Mostly what you can do is track someone down,” Quintin told The Center Square. “You would use this for a manhunt, or you would use this to see if somebody is in a specific house before you send in the SWAT team. That sort of thing.”
Quintin said the devices can see all phones within a radius ranging from a city block to about a mile.
“The potential for misuse here is staggering,” he said.
Documents point to equipment
In May, The Center Square filed a public records request with the Georgia Bureau of Investigation for records of its purchases of cell-site simulators. The documents provided showed two devices bought from auto dealers, as add-ons to vehicle purchases.
One purchase order, from Hardy Chevrolet GMC in Dallas, Georgia, shows a vehicle equipped with a “TSE cellular communications package” totaling $929,184.05, bought in September 2025.
Human Services’ purchase of the Chevrolet Traverse, in April, also came from Hardy Chevrolet GMC. A quote worksheet from the dealership, included in the provided documents, includes a “TSE cellular communication package” with a price of $890,478.80. With a discounted price of $38,705.25 for the Traverse itself, that makes the total identical to the amount of the GBI’s cell-site simulator down to the penny.
Quintin said it’s a “fair connection” to make. “If you are not buying a cell-site simulator, why are you spending $900,000 on a truck?” he said.
When pressed about the nature of the purchase, Chief of Staff Apsey asked several times to speak off the record, which would have meant nothing stated in that context could be disclosed in a story. The Center Square declined.
Asked pointedly if the extra expense was for a cell-site simulator, and if it’s legal for Human Services or the SVU team to have that technology, Apsey said, “I can’t confirm or deny that we even have one.”
The CEO of Hardy Chevrolet GMC, Rene Gordon, would not explain the vehicle price either, saying her legal department advised her not to talk about something bought by a customer, even the government.
TANF funds used
Earlier this year, Human Services had a massive budget shortfall that prompted the commissioner to cancel or suspend millions of dollars in contracted services for foster families, children and parents ensnared in the system. The General Assembly plugged the shortfall with an $81 million influx of cash.
Lawmakers allocated $1.12 billion for the department’s fiscal year 2027 budget.
In written answers to questions provided to the legislature’s Joint Study Committee on Evaluating Escalating Costs in Georgia’s Foster Care System, Human Services said the SVU team has cost $2.87 million in fiscal year 2026, including $1.5 million for personnel, nearly $329,000 in computer charges, and $954,578 for vehicle purchases—the same total amount of the Chevrolet Traverse, including the $25,394 installation.
Written below that chart is a note indicating the unit is funded at some level by federal Temporary Assistance for Needy Families money, saying “SVU was referenced in our federally approved TANF State Plan …” In one of its statements for The Center Square, the department called using TANF money for surveillance tools “a permissible use.” The SVU team is also included in the department’s TANF spending plan submitted to the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services.
Rep. Oliver, a member of the House Judiciary Juvenile and Appropriations committees, told The Center Square she’s heard rumors that the department acquired a $1 million surveillance technology instrument that requires search warrants and can intercept phone calls under certain circumstances.
“This kind of sophisticated and expensive equipment should be managed by law-enforcement professionals with careful attention to the 4th amendment,” Oliver said in an email. “I would rather see this (amount of money) spent on mental health support for traumatized children.”
