Amended in Assembly September 11, 2015

Amended in Assembly September 4, 2015

Amended in Assembly August 17, 2015

Amended in Senate June 1, 2015

Amended in Senate April 14, 2015

Senate Bill No. 548

Introduced by Senator De León

(Coauthors: Senators Hancock and Jackson)

(Coauthors: Assembly Members Atkins and Weber)

February 26, 2015

An act to add Article 19.5 (commencing with Section 8430) to Chapter 2 of Part 6 of Division 1 of Title 1 of the Education Code, relating to child care.

LEGISLATIVE COUNSEL’S DIGEST

SB 548, as amended, De León. Child care: family child care providers: begin insert orientation end insert training.

Existing law, the California Child Day Care Facilities Act, provides for the licensure and regulation of family day care homes by the State Department of Social Services. Existing law, the Child Care and Development Services Act, administered by the State Department of Education, requires the Superintendent of Public Instruction to administer child care and development programs that offer a full range of services for eligible children from infancy to 13 years of age, including, among others, resource and referral programs, alternative payment programs, and family child care home education networks.

The bill would require the State Department of Education to ensure that all family child care providers, as defined, attend an in-person orientation training, as provided. The bill would require the orientation training to include at least 4 hours of instruction and include specified information, including minimum health and safety begin delete standards. end delete begin insert standards, as provided. end insert The bill would authorize the Superintendent to adopt rules and regulations regarding the orientation training. The bill would provide that the above provisions are contingent upon an appropriation of funds for these purposes in the annual Budget Act or other statutes.

The bill would require the State Department of Social Services and the State Department of Education, with the assistance of specified state departments and agencies, and their contractors and subcontractors, to make specified information regarding family child care providers available to provider organizations, and would require the provider organization requesting the information to bear the costs of collecting the information, as provided.

Vote: majority. Appropriation: no. Fiscal committee: yes. State-mandated local program: no.

The people of the State of California do enact as follows:

SECTION 1.  

The Legislature finds and declares all of the
following:

(a) Quality, affordable child care is essential to prepare
California’s children to succeed in school and in life and to allow
families to work and contribute to the state’s economy with the
assurance that their children are safe, well cared for, and learning.

(b) Family child care is the child care setting of choice for many
families because of its warm homelike environment, convenience,
and affordability. The flexibility offered by many family child care
providers is particularly vital to low-wage workers who are subject
to highly unpredictable work schedules, and to the many California
workers who work nontraditional hours and need child care on
evenings, overnights, and weekends. Close to 40 percent of licensed
family child care homes offer evening, weekend, and overnight
care, compared with only 2 percent of centers.

(c) Family child care providers are small business owners who
contribute significantly to the economies of their communities and
the state. As businesses, family child care providers are engines
for economic growth, generating 100,000 direct and indirect jobs,
three billion five hundred million dollars ($3,500,000,000) in
economic output, and five hundred fifty million dollars
($550,000,000) in tax revenues. Family child care providers also
contribute to the economy by serving as a vital job support for
working families.

(d) Family child care providers face significant health and safety
risks on the job, and will thus benefit from training on occupational
safety and health.

(e) Giving family child care providers training on how to better
navigate the state-funded child care system, including how to
become licensed, will result in a more efficient and cost-effective
system for family child care providers, families, and the state.

(f) California currently does not have a single list of all family
child care providers who participate in the state-funded child care
program. Creating such a list will enable the state to track and
ensure compliance with training and background check
requirements. Making that list available to provider organizations
that will enable family child care providers to meet one another,
be informed about training opportunities, and form and build
organizations will allow them to share their common concerns and
advocate to improve the quality, access, and stability of child care
available to California’s children and families. This will allow the
state to maximize its return on its investment in child care.

SEC. 2.  

Article 19.5 (commencing with Section 8430) is added
to Chapter 2 of Part 6 of Division 1 of Title 1 of the Education
Code, to read:

 

Article 19.5.  Raising Child Care Quality Act

 

8430.  

This article shall be known, and may be cited, as the
Raising Child Care Quality Act.

8431.  

The purpose of this article is to ensure that family child
care providers receive orientation training on subjects including
occupational health and safety practices and standards and the
state’s early learning foundations, and to make it more possible
for family child care providers to be informed about training
opportunities and to form and join provider organizations to share
their common concerns and advocate for improvements to the
state-funded child care system.

8432.  

As used in this article:

(a) “Family child care provider” or “provider” means a child
care provider that participates in a state-funded child care program
and is either of the following:

(1) A family day care home provider, as described in Section
1596.78 of the Health and Safety Code, who is licensed pursuant
to the requirement in Section 1596.80 of the Health and Safety
Code.

(2) An individual who meets both of the following criteria:

(A) Provides child care in his or her own home or in the home
of the child receiving care.

(B) Is exempt from licensing requirements pursuant to Section
1596.792 of the Health and Safety Code.

(b) “Provider organization” means an organization that has all
of the following characteristics:

(1) Includes family child care providers as members.

(2) Has as one of its main purposes the representation of family
child care providers in their relations with public or private entities
in California or in advancing the concerns of providers regarding
the terms of their participation in state-funded child care programs.

(3) Is not an entity that contracts with the state or a county to
administer or process payments for a state-funded child care
program.

(c) “State-funded child care program” means a program
administered by the State Department of Education, the State
Department of Social Services, or another department, agency, or
political subdivision of the state, including programs established
subsequent to the passage of this article, to subsidize early learning
and care for children, but not including the public education system.

8433.  

(a) To ensure that family child care providers have the
opportunity to receive substantive training on topics including
health and safety standards for child care workers, child care
subsidy program functioning, and the state’s early learning
foundations, the State Department of Education shall ensure that
all family child care providers attend an in-person orientation
training. Providers who are new to the state-funded child care
program shall complete the orientation training within three months
after they begin participating in the state-funded child care
program. Providers who are already participating in the
state-funded child care program shall complete the orientation
training within two years after it is first offered. Other child care
providers who are not family child care providers or who do not
participate in the state-funded child care program may also be
invited to attend the orientation training at no cost to the providers
personally.

(b) Family child care providers shall be compensated for their
time attending the orientation training. The orientation training
shall be offered at times and in community-based settings that are
convenient and accessible to family child care providers.

(c) If a substantial number of the family child care providers
participating in the state-funded child care program in a given
county are non-English speaking, some orientation training,
including written material distributed at the training, in that county
shall be provided in the languages spoken by a substantial number
of family child care providers, in order to facilitate full participation
from all providers.

(d) Alternatives to in-person orientation training shall be offered
on a case-by-case basis for providers who have been unable to
attend an orientation training within two years after the training
begin delete are end delete begin insert is end insert first offered, or within three months after the family child
care provider begins participating in the state-funded child care
program.

(e) An orientation training shall include at least four hours of
begin delete instruction and end delete begin insert instruction, which shall be in addition to training
currently offered by resource and referral programs, and which
is intended to count towards satisfying pre-service or orientation
training requirements of federal law. The orientation training end insert shall
include information about all of the following:

(1) Minimum health and safety standards, begin delete as required by Section
658E of the Child Care and Development Block Grant Act (42
U.S.C. Sec. 9858c). end delete begin insert including emergency preparedness and
response planning. end insert

(2) Occupational health and safety for family child care
providers, including information about injuries, infectious diseases,
environmental risks, and job-related stress.

(3) Information about the state-funded child care program,
including the referral and listing process of resource and referral
agencies, alternative payment programs, including family approval
and payment processes, timelines, appeals processes, licensing
guidelines, and the process for becoming a licensed family child
care provider.

(4) Information about the state’s early learning foundations and
how they align with K-5 standards.

(5) Information on resources available to providers and the
children and families they serve, including all of the following:

(A) The federal Child and Adult Care Food Program.

(B) The state early intervention system, First 5 county
commissions, and other sources of available training and resources,
particularly related to child development, literacy, and alignment
with K-5 standards.

(C) Information from provider organizations that notify the
State Department of Education they would like to make
presentations at or include information about their organizations
at begin insert an end insert orientation training. These programs or organizations may
deliver this information through brief presentations as part of the
orientation training.

(f) The State Department of Education shall offer the orientation
training either directly or through contracts. The occupational
safety and health portion of the training shall be offered through
contracts with a statewide organization that has expertise about
the state-funded child care program, that includes family child care
providers as members, and that is not an entity that contracts with
the state or a county to administer or process payments for a
state-funded child care program. begin insert The remainder of the training
shall be offered with local resource and referral programs, as
defined in subdivision (x) of Section 8208. end insert

(g) Only curriculum approved by the State Department of
Education may be used to fulfill the training requirements specified
in this section. In order to ensure that the occupational safety and
health portion of the training reflects providers’ needs and the
realities of their work with regard to the occupational safety and
health portion of the training, the State Department of Education
shall only approve training curriculum that has been developed
with input from family child care providers or their representatives.

(h) The Superintendent may adopt rules and regulations
regarding the begin delete orientations end delete begin insert orientation training end insert required under this
section. The Superintendent may consult with other appropriate
entities, including provider organizations and other early education
and care advocates, representatives of community colleges, higher
education institutions, resource and referral networks, First 5
county commissions, organizations that operate training programs
or apprenticeship programs, and early education and care employers
in developing these rules and regulations.

(i) The requirements of this section are contingent upon
appropriation of funds for purposes of this section in the annual
Budget Act or other statutes.

8434.  

(a) Within 10 days of receipt of a request from a provider
organization, the State Department of Social Services shall make
available to that provider organization information regarding family
child care providers described in paragraph (1) of subdivision (a)
of Section 8432, including each provider’s name, home address,
mailing address, telephone number, email address, if known, and
license number.

(b) Within 30 days of receipt of a request from a provider
organization, the State Department of Education, with the
assistance of the State Department of Social Services and any state
department or agency, or its contractor or subcontractor, in
possession of the relevant information, shall collect information
regarding family child care providers, including each provider’s
name, home address, mailing address, telephone number, email
address, if known, unique provider identification number, if
applicable, and shall make that information available to the
provider organization. The provider organization shall bear the
reasonable costs of collecting the information described in this
subdivision to the extent that the state is not already collecting it
and is not already required by federal or state law or regulation to
collect begin delete it. end delete begin insert it, with any such payment going to reimburse the state
departments, agencies, contractors, or subcontractors that incurred
the costs of compiling the list. It is the intent of the Legislature
that this list will assist the State Department of Social Services
and the State Department of Education and their contractors in
tracking provider compliance. end insert

(c) A provider organization under this article shall be considered
a family day care organization for purposes of subdivisions (b)
and (c) of Section 1596.86 of the Health and Safety Code. All
confidentiality requirements applicable to recipients of information
pursuant to Section 1596.86 of the Health and Safety Code apply
to provider organizations and shall apply also to protect the
personal information of family child care providers as defined in
paragraph (2) of subdivision (a) of Section 8432.

(d) Upon written request of a family child care provider, the
State Department of Education and the State Department of Social
Services shall remove the family child care provider’s home
address and home telephone number from the mailing lists
referenced in subdivisions (a) and (b) before the release of the
lists.