[Vision2020] Panel Rejects Day-Care Rules

[Tom Hansen]

What is even more frightening about the non-passage of HB 163 is that Jamin
Wight, due to his plea agreement, can open a day care center here in Idaho
and potentially hire Steven Sitler as a care provider.

And here we have Idaho . . .

Tom Hansen
Moscow, Idaho

"If not us, who?
If not now, when?"

- Unknown

-----Original Message-----
From: vision2020-bounces at moscow.com [mailto:vision2020-bounces at moscow.com]
On Behalf Of Tom Hansen
Sent: Tuesday, February 27, 2007 6:29 AM
To: Vision 2020
Subject: [Vision2020] Panel Rejects Day-Care Rules

>From today's (February 27, 2007) Spokesman Review -

"House Bill 163 originally would have set minimal health and safety
standards, training requirements, and staffing levels, and required criminal
history checks for day cares caring for as few as two unrelated children."

House Bill 163
http://www3.state.id.us/oasis/H0163.html

Let me see if I have this right.  The Idaho state legislature refuses to
raise minimum wage.  That same state legislature refuses to impose health
and safety standards on day care centers.

Well . . . so much for the working family in Idaho.

Welcome to Idaho.  Please set your clocks back sixty years.

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Panel rejects day-care rules 
House committee limits supporters; 2 members suggest mothers stay home
 
Betsy Z. Russell 
Staff writer
February 27, 2007

BOISE - With some members saying mothers should stay home with their
children, members of a House committee on Monday killed legislation to
require minimum safety standards and criminal history checks for Idaho day
cares.

"It's gut-wrenching for me," Rep. Tom Loertscher, R-Iona, said before the
6-5 vote against the bill. "What can we do to keep mom at home?"

Loertscher said he "cannot imagine" ever taking a child to a day-care center
and said, "There is no substitute, there is absolutely no substitute for
families taking care of children."
 
Rep. Steven Thayn, R-Emmett, said, "Being separate from your mother .
there's reason to believe this could be harmful."

The House Health and Welfare Committee kept backers of the day-care
licensing bill waiting until long after 5 p.m. for a hearing that was
scheduled to start at 1:30 - after it was put off last week - then limited
them to three minutes apiece to testify in favor of the bill.

A stunned Cathy Kowalski, a Coeur d'Alene early childhood consultant who has
worked on the bill for three years, said, "I think it is a committee whose
members are definitely out of touch with the needs of their constituents,
and I think the working families in their districts need to let them know."

Sylvia Chariton, who testified in favor of the bill on behalf of the
American Association of University Women of Idaho, said, "It's ridiculous -
those men live in a time warp, when 60 percent of all mothers of children
under 6 years of age take them someplace to be cared for."

Rep. George Sayler, D-Coeur d'Alene, the bill's lead sponsor, told the
committee, "For working parents it is a vital concern."

His bill, HB 163, originally would have set minimal health and safety
standards, training requirements, and staffing levels, and required criminal
history checks for day cares caring for as few as two unrelated children,
but he offered amendments to raise that to apply only to those caring for
six or more children. "We're not trying to be burdensome," Sayler told the
committee.

Karen Mason, executive director of the Idaho Association for the Education
of Young Children, told of complaints her group has received about children
being locked in rooms at day cares with no escape, infants never taken out
of playpens, and unqualified caregivers with criminal backgrounds.

Elena Rodriguez of Idaho Voices for Children said, "The current lack of
adequate standards for child care puts children at risk. . That's what we
want to correct."

More than 70,000 Idaho children under age 5 are in day care, Rodriguez told
the committee. 

All the testimony was in favor of the bill, except that of one state
representative, Rep. JoAn Wood, R-Rigby. Wood testified that when she served
on the Health and Welfare Committee 25 years ago, "we had almost the same
information brought to us."

At that time, she said, the panel opted against state licensing for centers
with fewer than 13 children. "I would plead with you . I think it's working
well," Wood told the committee. "We just don't see the problems there in the
rural area where I am."

Rep. John Rusche, D-Lewiston, a physician who serves on the committee,
disagreed. He said he's seen terrible cases, including a toddler who drowned
in a horse trough that wasn't separated from the day care and other children
with severe injuries suffered in unsafe day cares.

Nine Idaho cities, including Coeur d'Alene, have stricter day-care licensing
rules, but operators who run afoul of city regulations can move outside city
limits.

Boise businessman Bill Ziegert told the panel, "Our world has changed, and
we no longer live in a society where all preschool children stayed at home
or were left with relatives." He said for his employees day care is
essential, and he called the bill "important and necessary."

Rep. Pete Nielsen, R-Mountain Home, said he thought that if the committee
agreed to amend the bill, the backers would only try to remove the
amendments in the future. "They only submitted the amendments to try and get
us to buy off on this," he said.

Rep. Lynn Luker, R-Boise, urged support.

"When I first saw this bill I was not in favor of it, but with the
amendments I am more supportive of it. Because in our society, it's
different than it was 15 or 20 years ago," he said.

Rep. Paul Shepherd, R-Riggins, said, "It's a tough one for me, because my
district has some large communities that it will be a positive thing, but I
also have way more communities that it will be detrimental. . I don't see
why we need to address it."

Wood told the panel, "I think you're going to put a lot of young women that
babysit out of business."

In the final vote, the committee's three Democrats and two Republicans voted
in favor of the amended bill. In addition to Rusche and Luker, they included
Sharon Block, R-Idaho Falls; and Boise Democrats Sue Chew and Margaret
Henbest.

Six Republicans voted against the bill even as amended: Reps. Nielsen,
Loertscher, Thayn and Shepherd; Janice McGeachin, R-Idaho Falls; and Jim
Marriott, R-Blackfoot.

Sayler said afterward, "What can I say - it's disappointing. I'll tell you,
frankly what I heard was not concern for children - it was concern about
regulation. . Our society has changed."

Ziegert, the Boise businessman, said, "It was amazing to me, that you could
have all of the testimony in support of it, people with facts and so forth,"
and still the committee rejected the bill.

Kowalski said, "The problem has not been solved. . The issue will not go
away."

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Seeya round town, Moscow.

Tom Hansen
Moscow, Idaho

"If not us, who?
If not now, when?"

- Unknown


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