[Vision2020] ign'ant Idahoans against daycare

Tue Feb 27 18:42:18 PST 2007

So is the whole point that these ignorant people are
trying to make daycare unsafe so as to keep moms at
home? Or what? And even if moms (OR DADS) wanted to
stay at home to care for their children 24/7, how many
can afford to do that these days? Shouldn't it be a
CHOICE??? Oh wait, R's don't like that word.

Debbie Gray

spokesman review
Panel rejects day-care rules
House committee limits supporters; 2 members suggest
mothers stay home
Betsy Z. Russell
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."

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.

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Debbie Gray                dgray at uidaho.edu
"We must be willing to get rid of the life we've
planned, 
so as to have the life that is waiting for us."
--Joseph Campbell 
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