Child care as a religious ministry

Here's an interesting case in Pennsylvania, yet another case where I don't know all the facts, but that won't keep me from speculating.

In 1997 the Pennsylvania Department of Public Welfare closed down a Catholic church's child care operation in its basement. They had 20 kids. The state says all child care centers should follow certain developmental goals. The church says that interferes with their religious freedom. An appeals court has just agreed with the state. I don't.

How much risk can kids take?

This lady in Santa Barbara (LA Times photo at right by Kirk McKoy) has a family child care, and she takes the kids to the beach to look for crabs. Her shtick is teaching outdoor stuff to preschoolers.

When they're done with the crabs, her son and one of the kids in her care climb a hill at the back of the beach. They've done this before, and they like to climb. She thought it was a good challenge for them, with enough hand holds to make it doable.

One of the kids, the caretaker's own four-year-old, got scared at one point, so the caretaker went up and got him down. Two other kids reached the top and were guided back down by lifeguards.

According to the article in the LA Times, passersby called the cops, who called licensing, who suspended her license for "conduct inimical to the health, morals, welfare, or safety" of children.

Now obviously I wasn't there, but I think I'm on the provider's side here, especially since the parents thought it was fine. She had known the kids for years and knew what they could do. I figured with my own issue that a broken bone or two in the course of a childhood was an acceptable risk for the reward of kids successfully climbing stuff.

If she and the parents have agreed that this hill is a good climb for their kids, that should be enough for licensing.

Child care at Las Vegas casinos

This AP article says

The Las Vegas Convention and Visitors Authority is pressing for a county code change that would let casinos provide temporary day care for conventions.

Current Clark County regulations allow resorts to set up permanent play areas for children but do not address licensing temporary child care at casino-convention areas.

Industry representatives say convention-goers prefer to have children looked after in the same meeting hall or in the room next door, not on a different floor or several blocks away.

They want their children within sight or close enough to check on at a moment's notice, said Yvette Monet, spokeswoman for MGM Mirage. Temporary licensing gives casinos the flexibility to set up day care areas wherever the meetings are held, she added.

My first question is what the county regulations have to do with licensing child care facilities. There is a Nevada Bureau of Services for Child Care. I couldn't find any reference to temporary licensing on their web page. Or maybe they'll just call it drop-in care, because the parents are on-site, so the county regs come in as a business license thing rather than a child care licensing thing.

My second question is how temporary licensing would work. In California, CCL wants a lot of information about a site. I suppose Nevada licensing could inspect all the proposed temporary sites ahead of time, and then either let that stand when a convention that needs child care comes to town, or check right before a particular convention, to make sure standards are still being met.

My third question is what the temporary casino centers would be like. I'm not a Vegas person. I was there once, ten years or so ago, and spent an hour or so in a kids area in the basement of a casino. It was full of kid games with all the sounds and flashing lights and action of the real upstairs gambling games. That it, it was certainly too loud and active for me, but it also certainly hyped up the kids. I wonder if the casino/convention child care would use the same model of pretend gambling.

Unscheduled child care by the hour

A lady in Los Altos has opened a child care center for what she calls "drop-in play care." (This is not what Licensing calls drop-in care. The parents do not stay on-site, so it's unscheduled licensed child care.)

They have an 8:1 ratio and charge $15 an hour for one kid, $24 for 2 and $30 for 3, ages 2 to 6, with multi-use discount punch cards.

There is a need for this. I hope there is enough business for her to make it.

The odd thing is that the center's website makes no mention of being licensed. I must assume they are. It says she got her city operating permit, but nowhere does it say she's licensed by Community Care Licensing. It says:

Child's Play is a play-based drop-in center, catering to parents and caregivers who need short-term childcare. The employees of the center all have early childcare experience – they have taken many classes and have worked in preschool and toddler facilities. They have all had background and fingerprint checks, and every staff member is CPR certified for children.

It goes on about the founder's experience babysitting and working at family camps and as a nanny in college. She worked some in a daycare in Vail. "She also has taken many early childcare development classes." I'm not sure "early childcare development classes" is the way I would phrase it, but hey, she's the expert.

Sometimes I wish I weren't such a cynical person. Of course, she's licensed. Nobody would open up and advertise a for-profit child care center without getting licensed. Would it be untrustful of me to email my friend in licensing to ask? No, I should go to ccld.ca.gov and check first.

Oh, my. The message reads, "No facilities match the criteria."

I should email my friend in licensing.

State offices open on Columbus day

Our local licensing office is open today, Columbus day, when all state offices used to be closed. I guess to make up for the loss of productivity from state employees taking unpaid furloughs, we'll make them work on what used to be a paid holiday.

Licensing costs in Arizona

You think we  have it bad in California? In Arizona, licensing for a center with 150 or more kids will rise from $150 a year to $13,442 on January 1.

Worst state law nominee: Michigan

This lady in Michigan lives in front of the school bus stop. Neighborhood kids come inside her living room to wait for the bus on winter mornings (and probably fall and spring mornings, too), so their parents can go to work. Michigan Department of Social Services says that means she's running an unlicensed child care center, even though no money changed hands, and she must get licensed or cease and desist, and nobody seems to think DSS is misapplying the law. The governor and legislators realize the law they wrote  had unexpected stupid consequences are working quickly to change it.

I wonder what California licensing would think about this situation. My guess is it would technically be the same as Michigan. Money doesn't have to change hands to make it child care, and she was "caring for" kids of more than one family. It wasn't a coop, because other moms weren't sharing the caring.

CCL would probably say they don't have enough staff to investigate piddly crap like that. In my area, CCL is mostly pretty reasonable.

Update: The governor of Michigan has told the head of DSS to back off prosecution and work with legislators to change the law.