BILL ANALYSIS �
SENATE HUMAN
SERVICES COMMITTEE
Senator Jim Beall, Chair
BILL NO: AB 2621
A
AUTHOR: Garcia
B
VERSION: May 23, 2014
HEARING DATE: June 24, 2014
2
FISCAL: Yes
6
2
CONSULTANT: Sara Rogers
1
SUBJECT
Child day care facilities: licensing information
SUMMARY
This bill requires the California Department of Social
Service (CDSS) to make specified licensing information
regarding day care centers and homes available on its
internet website and to update the information monthly.
ABSTRACT
Existing Law:
1.Establishes the California Child Day Care Facilities Act
to provide for the licensure and regulation of child day
care and family day care facilities as a separate
licensing category within the existing licensing
structure of CDSS. (HSC 1596.72 et seq.)
2.Provides for the CDSS licensure and regulation of small
family day care homes serving between six and eight
Continued---
STAFF ANALYSIS OF ASSEMBLY BILL 2621 (Garcia)
PageB
children, as specified, in a residentially zoned and
occupied property. (HSC 1597.30 et seq.)
3.Requires child care facilities and homes licensed by CDSS
to be subject to unannounced visits by CDSS and requires
the department to visit facilities as often as necessary
to ensure the quality of care provided. (HSC 1597.09 and
1597.55a)
4.Requires annual unannounced inspections when a license is
on probation, when required by the terms of a facility
compliance plan, when an accusation against the licensee
is pending, or to verify that a person who has been
ordered out of the facility is no longer present. (HSC
1597.09 and 1597.55a)
5.Requires CDSS to perform random inspections each year on
no fewer than 20 percent of facilities not subject to
annual inspections. Provides that this percentage shall
increase by 10 percent if the total citations issued by
the department exceeds the previous year by 10 percent.
As a result of this trigger, CDSS currently is required
to perform random inspections on 30 percent of the
facilities not subject to annual inspection. Requires
CDSS to visit every facility no less than every 5 years.
(HSC 1597.09 and 1597.55a)
This bill:
1.Codifies existing practice to require CDSS to post
licensing information on its internet website as follows:
For each day care center and large family day
care home, the information shall include, but is not
limited to, the name and address of the facility,
the status of the license, and the number of site
visits, including the number of substantiated and
inconclusive complaint inspections and noncomplaint
inspections, during the preceding five-year period.
STAFF ANALYSIS OF ASSEMBLY BILL 2621 (Garcia)
PageC
For each small family day care home, the
information shall include, but is not limited to,
the name of the home, the status of the license, and
the number of site visits, including the number of
substantiated and inconclusive complaint inspections
and noncomplaint inspections, during the preceding
five-year period.
1.Requires the department to update the information posted
pursuant to this bill at least monthly.
FISCAL IMPACT
The current version of this bill has not been analyzed by a
fiscal committee however the current language of the bill
codifies the online public database that CDSS released
earlier this month.
BACKGROUND AND DISCUSSION
According to the author, California law fails to provide
easily accessible means for parents to learn about
inspection and complaint reports that have been filed
against state-licensed day care, preschool and after-school
programs. The author states that "families entrusting the
care of their children assume that lawmakers have provided
them protection against child care facilities that violate
the law, but reporting a violation means nothing if the
information is not made transparent to families."
The California Child Day Care Facilities Act requires the
licensing and regulation by CDSS of more than 11,100
licensed child care facilities (providing 716,610 slots)
and 33,300 licensed family day care homes (providing
367,264 slots).<1> In addition to licensed child care
facilities, the Act establishes license exempt providers
including relatives, child care cooperative arrangements,
as defined, extended care programs operated by public or
-------------------------
<1> Resource and Referral Network, 2013 Portfolio. (Report
cites 2012 data)
STAFF ANALYSIS OF ASSEMBLY BILL 2621 (Garcia)
PageD
private schools with 85 percent of children served from
that school, day care where only one additional family is
served and nanny services, including nanny shares, as
specified.
The Community Care Licensing (CCL) division of CDSS
provides the primary public oversight over the quality and
care provided in licensed child care facilities and homes.
Prior to January 2004, CCL conducted annual visits of all
child care facilities and homes as well as other licensed
facilities within its jurisdiction. However, as a result of
a series of budget cuts beginning in 2003, CCL began
inspecting facilities based on a random sample protocol.
Under this scenario, those facilities that warrant close
monitoring because of a poor history of compliance are
monitored annually, as well as facilities that are
federally required to be inspected annually. Typically,
this comprises about 10 percent of all facilities. Of the
remaining 90 percent, approximately 30 percent are randomly
selected for inspection each year. The current five-year
inspection mandate was intended to catch facilities that
are not randomly selected at least that often for
inspection.
Transparency
Current law requires CDSS to post the results of a site
visit on, or immediately adjacent to, the interior side of
the main door of a child care facility including
information regarding whether the facility was cited for a
violation, the nature of that violation, as specified, and
to include a statement explaining that copies of the site
visit report may be obtained by contacting the
department.<2> The notice is required to remain posted for
30 consecutive days, except that a family day care home is
required to maintain the posting only during the hours when
clients are present. Also, the facility must provide copies
of a licensing report that documents serious, Type A
citations, to the parents or guardians of each child
receiving services, and for each newly enrolled child.
-------------------------
<2> Health and Safety Code Section 1596.817
STAFF ANALYSIS OF ASSEMBLY BILL 2621 (Garcia)
PageE
Licensed child day care facility additionally are required
to make accessible to the public a copy of any licensing
report that documents a facility visit, a substantiated
complaint investigation, a conference with a local
licensing agency management representative and the licensee
in which issues of noncompliance are discussed, or a copy
of an accusation indicating the department's intent to
revoke the facility's license.<3> Licensing documents are
not required to be maintained beyond three years from the
date of issuance.
Further, state funded child care resource and referral
programs and alternative payment programs are required to
advise parents who request referrals of their right to seek
and access licensing information from the Community Care
Licensing Division of CDSS.
CDSS publishes on its website a "myccl" webpage in which
the public can search for providers of child care by zip
code. Information found on the website includes the
facility's license number, its capacity and which CDSS
district office houses additional materials. However, the
website does not provide information about citations or
sanctions against providers. The primary reason for this is
a technology barrier, according CDSS. Also, information
public disclosure regarding the location of small family
homes, defined as caring for 6 or fewer children, is
prohibited under statute.
Currently, CDSS licensing staff input survey results,
including citation information, into an antiquated word
processing system, Lotus Notes, that does not interact with
any of the department's other data collection tools. As a
result, the department is unable to track patterns of poor
care within a single facility, or across facilities with
the same owner. CDSS is also unable to upload information
to its web site for the public to see citation information
on facilities. Efforts have been made to bridge the
antiquated field information system to interact with the
department's data collection systems, including a grant
from the California Health Care Foundation in 2008. However
the Lotus system is so old that those technology patches
have been unsuccessful. In order to acquire additional
information relating to the quality of a facility, a person
-------------------------
<3> Health and Safety Code Section 1596.859
STAFF ANALYSIS OF ASSEMBLY BILL 2621 (Garcia)
PageF
must either contact or travel to one of CDSS's eight
regional licensing offices and request the information
pertaining to a specific facility.
In response to increased media coverage of incidents that
have occurred in licensed care facilities across the state,
CDSS recently released an online database on its website to
provide more robust information about licensed facilities.
This bill seeks to codify the establishment of this
database which currently includes the following:
The name of the facility and licensee;
Contact information for the facility and its
licensed capacity;
The number of site visits, and the dates of those
visits;
The number of inspections, complaint
investigations, and other visits the facility has
received.
The number of substantiated and inconclusive
complaints filed against the facility, including
complaint severity and whether a complaint resulted in
a citation.
COMMENTS
Staff recommends amending the bill to reflect the content
of the CDSS website as well as a technical amendment as
follows:
SECTION 1. 1596.819
(a) Except as otherwise prohibited by law, the department
shall post licensing information on its Internet Web site
as follows:
(1) For each child day care facility as defined in Section
1596.750 center and large family day care home , with the
exception of small family day care homes , the information
shall include, but is not limited to, the name and address
of the facility, the licensed capacity, the status of the
license, and the number of site visits, including the
STAFF ANALYSIS OF ASSEMBLY BILL 2621 (Garcia)
PageG
number of substantiated and inconclusive complaint
inspections and noncomplaint inspections, and citations
assessed during the preceding five-year period.
(2) For each small family day care home, the information
shall include, but is not limited to, the name of the home,
the status of the license, and the number of site visits,
including the number of substantiated and inconclusive
complaint inspections and noncomplaint inspections, and
citations assessed during the preceding five-year period.
(b) The department shall update the information posted
under subdivision (a) on at least a monthly basis.
PRIOR VOTES
Assembly Floor 78 - 0
Assembly Appropriations 17 - 0
Assembly Human Services 6 - 0
POSITIONS
Support: California Alternative Payment Program
California Child Care Resource and Referral
Network
Children Now
1 individual
Oppose: None received.
-- END --
STAFF ANALYSIS OF ASSEMBLY BILL 2621 (Garcia)
PageH