Licensed Or Not? (Legally, Of Course)

[Springdaze]

Here it only benefits you to be licensed if parents care and if you want to take state pay. you can only have 5 whether you are registered or not. over 5 and you have to be a center. alot of our trainings are free because theres a grant from the state for classes about infants and toddlers, otherwise they are like 20 or so. the only problem I have is getting to the classes because they are at night and my kids daycare closes at 6. hubby works nights.

I think they should at least give some kind of ratio benefit if you register because then more might, although 5 kids is enough for me!

[Solandia]

I just turned in my license in January. I was a licensed home daycare for 10 years.

Here license exempt means only other family or a max of 3 unrelated kids. I am gradually phasing out of daycare altogether, my littlest dck is going to be 3...I have had him since before he was born (I had his school age brother since he was a baby).

Some of the "new regs" I do not agree with at all. Mostly paperwork type stuff, like I am supposed to keep an actual certified copy of a birth certificate on file for each child in care. A photocopy doesn't count..has to be a real, raised seal,etc one in my files and accessible to the licensor at any time. And if the the parent refuses (I wouldnt hand over a birth certificate to a person putting it in a file on top of her fridge, hello, identity theft?), then I would be required to report that to the local authorities regardless if they enroll with me or not. And then I have to keep the app, the date of refusal; & who I reported it to in a permenant file to be sent upon request to future schools that ask for it. HUH? Reason being, that if someone refused to hand over a birth certificate, the local authorites will investigate & the parent will have to prove the child is theirs and not abducted. It was part of a law passed 3 years ago,but didn't make it officially into the daycare regs until last summers, and enforcing across the board this year. i want no part of that. The public school doesn't even keep a certified copy, they just look at yours and hand it back. Total BS. I do not want the responsibility of maintaining sensitive documents like that, our daycare address are public record...a real birt certh, a matching ssn(easy to obtain if you have a real birth certificate) are freaking major black market items around here.

Another thing is being automatically enrolled in the quality star program. So I would never get past 2 or 3 stars because I disagree with the premise of some of the "above and beyond", primarily with creating and implementing lesson plans to babies and toddlers. Nope. Not gonna start with the pseudo preschool junk. And to top if off, the quality start thingy is a whole lot of interferring, you have to pay for visits, extra inspections, ...and I don't want my great awesomeness as a daycare provider shown as a 2/5 star facility. It looks awful.

There are some other things, but those are the biggest ones that made me say decide I dont want to go further. I love home daycare, but I can't do the licensing anymore.

[spud912]

1. I am allowed 4 children for pay and up to 6 including my own. That is more than enough. I don't want to hire an assistant and my house isn't big enough for more (well, in my opinion).
2. The license through one agency is $1000 or $500 if you join a program. Definitely not worth the $$. The other agency I can get licensed through already has too many daycares listed and is not permitting any new daycares.
3. I don't have the required back-up provider, especially someone who is willing to meet all of the state's requirements.
4. I don't want "business hours" and I don't want to be forced to stay open at every point throughout the year. I like the opportunity to take vacations and close when I want. If I get one of those treasured random days off or early "dismissals," I want to be able to leave the house and enjoy it!
5. I like the freedom of an open schedule where we can take field trips and walks without worrying about if someone is knocking on my door to inspect.
6. Some of the requirements are overly nit-picky, if you ask me. For example, I can have soap in the restroom at the sink, but I can't have baby shampoo in the bathtub!
7. I don't want to spend a ton of extra time doing the required paper work and trainings that is required. That time can be better spent unwinding and with my family.

There are many more reasons, but those are the ones I can think of off the top of my head. I am very happy with what I have and so are my families (and that's all that counts at this point).

[DCBlessings27]

Ks

I suppose that the state you live in makes all of the difference. Using mrsp'slilpeeps quote as a reference and my state's regulations as an example I think it benefits people in CA more to become licensed than to work license-exempt.

In CA:
1. licensed small FCC can have 8 kids total (2 infants, 4 toddlers, 2 SA), large FCC can have up tp 14. License-exempt childcare doesn't have ratio limitations BUT they either ALL have to be somehow related to you OR you can only take care of one families kids whether the family has 1 or 12. My own kids count in my numbers until they turn 12.

2. Pets are ok and we don't have to lock our pets up either no matter the breed (not even pitt-bulls). We'd have a harder time I think finding clients if we had "dangerous breeds" and some insurances won't give you liability insurance if you own a "dangerous breed" animal but licensing itself does not regulate against it unless you're dealing with aquariums or turtles (which simply have to have a lid). I've had exotic animals (like snakes, spiders and rodents) and they don't care.

3. We do have unnanounced visits, however potential clients feel better here about licensing being able to make surprise visits. It's actually a demand in my area (I had a harder time finding clients when I was licence-exempt. My clients then were family, friends or referrals from other clients).

4. Becoming licensed here is not expensive at all. I think I pay $65 a year to renew my license and the cost to renew my CPR certification every two-years. That's pretty much it. The norm around here is to have a background check and CPR certification and a clean TB test anyway whether you babysit, nanny, or work in a center or FCC anyway.

I've heard that in other state's the fees and regulations are REDICULOUS. I don't know that I'd be as willing to be licensed if I lived in one of these states even that knowing that CA has got a TON of regulations. Most are common sense anyway.

In KS, it's really not possible to be legally unlicensed. If you don't have a license, you can only watch up to 2 kids unrelated to you for less than 20 hours/week and not on a regular basis. It's more beneficial in KS to become licensed.

As a licensed provider I can:

Have up to 10 kids (1 infant 5 toddlers 4 SA). The numbers go down to 8 total if I have more infants enrolled.

Only be inspected once a year unless a complaint is filed.

Have pets as long as the records are up to date

The rules and regs keep changing for KS though, and they just passed regs that require a written supervision plan. Our fees are now $85 to our state. My county fees are $65, and my business license for my city is $35.