Looser NC rules for some child cares won't require background checks during pandemic

Sep. 7--RALEIGH -- When a version of the state coronavirus relief package began circulating Tuesday, headed for a vote by the North Carolina Senate the next day, it was too late for much public input about a provision that loosens licensing requirements for child care facilities.

Now set to become law, it will allow some child care facilities to operate during the school day with little oversight during a state of emergency. No background checks for employees will be required. Reporting confirmed COVID-19 cases to public health officials won't be mandatory, as it is in all other licensed child care facilities. Staff members will not need to be certified in CPR or first aid.

"In a rush to pass this bill in two days without a lot of input, we've created these huge loopholes," Rep. Julie von Haefen, a Democrat from Wake County, said in an interview. "Child care to me is a huge issue during the pandemic. The system operates on very thin margins. Now we're allowing more child care with less parameters."

Every Republican in the Senate Wednesday voted to set aside a proposed amendment that would have required these facilities have safeguards in place.

"We saw it when it was introduced, when everybody else got to see it," said Sherée Vodicka, CEO of the NC Alliance of YMCAs. Vodicka's organization was among those that requested legislation allowing them to operate full-time during the school day. "I didn't get any advance look at anything."

The provision, which has raised concerns among advocates, state officials and legislators, was included in House Bill 1105, a bill that distributed federal coronavirus relief money across North Carolina. The legislature returned on Tuesday to take it up, the Senate passed it swiftly Wednesday with few dissenting votes, the House followed suit on Thursday and Gov. Roy Cooper announced Friday he would sign it into law.

The provision makes changes to child care facility licensing requirements, allowing "community-based organizations" like YMCAs, YWCAs, Boys and Girls Clubs and parks and recreation programs to provide care for school-aged children at a "remote learning facility" during the coronavirus pandemic or any other state of emergency.

Previously, these community-based organizations could operate unlicensed only as full-day summer programs or after-school care programs, with some exceptions. But to provide care for school children who needed to participate in remote learning, they needed the legislature's help.

"We were trying to find an avenue where we could serve," Vodicka said. "The statute defines very specifically what child care is, which was making it challenging, and I think the other challenging thing about this particular area is that we're not really talking about child care, we're talking about an alternative to school. We've just never been in this place before. This is not normal."

Under rules recently changed by North Carolina'sChildcare Commission, community-based organizations like the YMCA can contract with a school to operate full-time during the coronavirus pandemic without a license.

"The very sensible solution was that if kids are in their school day, they'll have a connection to the school and they would have some oversight for these programs," said Susan Gale Perry, chief deputy secretary of the Department of Health and Human Services. "That was the way we had chosen to solve the problem."

But child care facilities said they needed more flexibility to serve school-aged children all day and provide a remote learning experience, so they turned to the legislature.

Loosening licensing

HB 1105, as it's currently written, seems to allow more than just a local YMCA or Boys and Girls Club to operate unlicensed during the school year because community-based organizations are so broadly defined in the bill.

With the expanded definition, state health officials and legislators say it could include nonprofits, churches and possibly more.

""We agree, we're grateful for the flexibility, but there are some basic protections that we really think parents will assume they have and they won't have the way the legislation is written,'" Sen. Terry Van Duyn, a Democrat from Asheville, said advocates told her.

So Van Duyn introduced an amendment that would have implemented some of those protections.

"Many of them were reaching out to me, but they were never given an opportunity to express their concerns about what was happening," Van Duyn said. "I don't want to be unreasonable, but I just want people to know if they're going to take children in they need to have a safe place."

Her amendment, if it had passed, would have ordered facilities caring for K-12 students to have at least one CPR and first-aid certified staff member on the premises, notify local health authorities of COVID-19 cases among children or staff and ensure staff or volunteers working there pass a background check, including a check of the child abuse and neglect registry.

With only two days to pass a spending bill worth nearly $1 billion, a majority of legislators voted to bar any debate on the amendment.

"I reached out to members, and they just weren't willing to change anything. I got to speak my piece and they got to do what they get to do, and hopefully children will nevertheless remain safe and we'll fix it next year," Van Duyn said.

Sen. Jim Perry, a Kinston Republican, championed the provision, arguing that parents in rural areas need choices for child care.

"We don't have the choices for child care that you have in many of the more urban areas," said Perry, who received calls from multiple parents concerned about their limited child care options. "These are real world scenarios that have been thrust upon these people. They asked for relief, I think we need to give it to them. The current regulations were not written with this in mind."

Perry also emphasized that the legislation will require facilities to comply with state COVID-19-related sanitation requirements.

It also requires that community-based organizations register with the state health department. But state officials said there is not currently a registration process in place.

NC YMCA Alliance CEO Vodicka said she hopes that registration requirement will allow the department to ensure facilities are following COVID-19 requirements.

Expanding the definition of child care

A second provision included in the bill expands the definition of child care. State officials said it's unclear how the language will be interpreted, but it seems to allow the arrangements being called "home-based learning pods" to operate with little state oversight.

The provision would exempt from the definition of child care "arrangements between a group of parents ... to provide for the instructional needs of their children, provided the arrangement occurs in the home of one of the cooperative participants."

"I think the intent there is really to make sure that families who, in this COVID time, are making these decisions about doing cooperative learning pods. I think it's designed to address that," said DHHS deputy secretary Perry. "I will say, I'm going to have to defer ultimately to lawyers both in the child care space and in the school space to make some choices about what they think this means about how it applies to school curriculum."

But that change is not specific to a state emergency, as is the case with the other provision. It would be implemented permanently.

"That to me felt like an oversight," Van Duyn said. "I thought that might be something that (Republicans) would actually embrace, but apparently not."

State officials said they may be able to address issues through the new registration process.

If not, Sen. Perry said he would be willing to revisit the language when the legislature reconvenes.

"I don't think you're ever going to have perfect legislation," Perry said. "I'm happy to revisit when we have more time. I don't have all the answers. I don't think anyone does."

For more North Carolina government and politics news, listen to the Domecast politics podcast from The News & Observer and the NC Insider. You can find it on Megaphone, Apple Podcasts, iHeartRadio, Stitcher or wherever you get your podcasts.

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