(1) When the state department receives a serious complaint about a child care facility licensed pursuant to this part 1 alleging the immediate risk of health or safety of the children cared for in such facility, the state department shall respond to and conduct an on-site investigation concerning such complaint within forty-eight hours of its receipt.
(2) (a) (I) The general assembly hereby finds that an audit completed by the state auditor's office in 1995 reported that the state department had not properly and timely carried out all of its child care facility licensing functions due to insufficient staff. The general assembly further finds that, in an effort to use the state department's limited child care resources more effectively and efficiently, it passed legislation in 1996 implementing a risk-based approach to inspecting and monitoring child care facilities in place of the mandatory biennial reviews of every facility. The general assembly finds that it was determined in a follow-up audit conducted by the state auditor's office in 1998, that the state department was still at least one month late in conducting inspections of approximately twenty-two percent of the child care facilities in Colorado. In addition, of those facilities assigned a high risk factor and thereby requiring inspections more frequently than every twelve months, twenty-six percent were at least three months past due. In evaluating the implementation of the risk-based approach to inspection and monitoring of child care facilities, the general assembly finds that the implementation of this approach has actually increased the state department's workload by approximately sixteen percent.
The general assembly further finds that a national study conducted by the center forcareer development in early care and education at Wheelock College concluded that Colorado's child care facility licensing staff had caseloads of approximately two hundred fifty child care centers per full-time equivalent employee and five hundred family child care homes per full-time equivalent employee. The general assembly finds that the caseloads of Colorado child care employees within the division greatly exceed the number of cases recommended by the national association for the education of young children, which organization has recommended that child care regulators' caseloads should not exceed seventy-five centers and large family homes per full-time equivalent employee.
The general assembly further finds that the insufficient number of child care facilityinspectors puts children at risk particularly when serious complaints of an immediate nature concerning a child care facility are lodged with the state department and the department is unable to respond promptly and conduct an on-site investigation of the complaint.
The general assembly hereby determines that the health and safety of the childrenof the state of Colorado in child care facilities is of utmost concern and importance to the state. The general assembly further finds that the timely and proper inspection of child care facilities and prompt responses to serious complaints about a child care facility are priorities and that, in order to facilitate such timely inspections and responses to complaints, the state department should be provided with the ability to contract with the necessary personnel needed to conduct the required inspections and investigations on a thorough and timely basis. Accordingly, the general assembly determines that it is in the best interests of the citizens of the state of Colorado that the number of persons contracted for and charged with the duty of inspecting, monitoring, and responding to complaints in child care facilities in the state of Colorado be increased.
(b) For the purposes of conducting thorough and timely inspections of child care facilities licensed pursuant to this part 1 and for the purposes of providing sufficient inspectors to conduct prompt responses and investigations as directed in subsection (1) of this section when the state department receives a serious complaint against a child care facility licensed pursuant to this part 1, in fiscal year 2000-01, the number of inspectors shall be increased by eighteen contract inspectors from the number of inspectors in fiscal year 1999-2000.
Source: L. 2000: Entire section added, p. 1258, § 1, effective May 26.