Department of Early Learning - Journey into a Nightmare

CES_FHCC_WAC_170-296A_final.pdf (application/pdf Object)

This is actually a thank you to the Department of Early Learning (DEL).

My intent is to give kudos when kudos apply. Today I say thank you to the Department of Early Learning (DEL) for their transparency in documenting the journey of how the new family home child day care rules and regulations came to be and which are to be implemented in 2012 came to be.

I blog for the benefit of parents who must go to work and who must put their children in daycare. And today I want to give you some insider witnessing and my opinion.

I sat in on some of these Negotiated Rule Making Team (NRMT) meetings, sometimes as a substitute for and representing the non-profit organization Washington Parents for Safe Child Care; the sole parent voice.

From the introduction to this document in the link above: "RCW 34.05.325(6) requires that when a state agency adopts a permanent rule (known as Washington Administrative Code or WAC), the agency must prepare a “Concise Explanatory Statement” (CES). This statement is a public document that generally summarizes comments received on a state agency’s proposed rules, notes the agency’s responses to those comments, and whether the comment resulted in any changes to the final rule compared to the proposal"

Parents and citizens of Washington State, it was a nightmare!  As Spencer Breslin child actor in the Disney movie The Kid yelled, "a nightmare".  If it wasn't about the health, safety and well-being of children it would be funny.

I give my kudos to DEL for being transparent. Representative Ross Hunter from Bellevue has long advocated for complete transparency in government.  This long document moves in that direction. It recorded the comments of family home child day providers who were overwhelmingly represented on this NRMT. Parents were not represented.

Revising the rules was delayed for almost eight (8) years because of this certain segment of the licensed family home child day care provider community and the Service Employees International Union (SEIU).

Parents were not represented.

Stu Jacobson, director of Washington Parents for Safe Child Care was on the NRMT and all work ground to a halt one meeting day when I was present as the day care providers were in an uproar because Mr. Jacobson spoke to the press. These day care providers stopped talking about the health, safety and well-being of the child in licensed day care to focus their energy and attention on taking away Mr. Jacobson's Constitutional first amendment rights.

Advising these day care providers that the committee work they were doing was public, that all their meetings were public meetings had no effect on their outrage and desire for revenge. It was as though this committee was their private little club.

Like Dave Barry writes, "I'm not making this up."

Like Carrie Fisher wrote in her memoir Wishful Drinking:  "If this wasn't funny, it would just be true."

This is a long state record document and I have only read up to page 31 and scanned through some of the rest. But I want parents to have access to this document now for their own review.

I recommend reading the "comments column" as it is in the providers' own words and you can get a sense of the attitude and the focus of some of the child day care providers on this committee.

I say kudos to DEL for in many instances not changing the Washington Administrative Code (WAC) rule when this certain segment of day care providers and SEIU demanded it; and for reminding this group of day care providers that rules must match the law.  In Washington State that is the Revised Code of Washington (RCW). That's what we call our laws.

Read the provider comments for yourselves and decide which of their comments are truly for and which are truly not for the health, safety and well-being of your child. The child you must give over to the care of a day care provider that you pay to keep your child healthy, safe and happy while you are at work. 

A provider at one of the meetings when I substituted for Washington Parents for Safe Child Care said it wasn't the government's business if after day care hours she was a hooker on the street.

SEIU isn't taking your parental money to keep your children safe.

SEIU takes money from all folks in Washington State (and those visiting), easy money on a monthly basis with the state government acting as their banking system.

So kudos to DEL today.  Tomorrow the question is: will DEL enforce these regulations fairly and consistently?  That is and has always been the key.