Children: child care; passing along fees for criminal background checks to certain childcare employees to the employees; prohibit. Amends secs. 5d & 5n of 1973 PA 116 (MCL 722.115d & 722.115n).
SB 64 amends Michigan’s child care licensing law to strengthen and standardize criminal background screening for people working in or living in child care settings. The bill requires child care organizations to run criminal history checks before making conditional offers of employment, bars hiring or continued employment for individuals with listed offenses, and prohibits employers from passing the cost of those checks on to applicants or employees. It also requires fingerprint-based checks for child caring institution staff and, when a conviction is found, a written suitability evaluation before the person may begin work.
The bill expands and clarifies the Department of Licensing and Regulatory Affairs’ screening duties for child care centers, group child care homes, and family child care homes. It requires review of disciplinary history, sex offender registry checks, state criminal registry checks for prior states of residence, and state police/FBI fingerprint checks, with additional clearance requirements for people who lived outside the United States in the prior five years. It also sets timelines for eligibility determinations, allows supervised work while checks are pending, provides a redetermination process for disputed or expunged records, and requires updated checks at least every five years for continuously licensed or employed individuals.
SB 64 would amend sections 5d and 5n of 1973 PA 116, the state’s child care licensing statute, by tightening criminal background check requirements and clarifying who must be screened before working in or residing in regulated child care settings. It would affect child care organizations, child care centers, group child care homes, family child care homes, child caring institutions, applicants, staff members, household members, and the Department of Licensing and Regulatory Affairs, as well as the Department of State Police and FBI through fingerprint-based checks. The bill also expressly prohibits shifting background check costs to workers or applicants and reinforces periodic re-checks and record review procedures.
The bill’s overall posture is protective and compliance-oriented, with the caption indicating a focus on preventing child care employers from passing background check fees to employees. Even without recorded committee testimony or votes in the provided materials, the text suggests a generally child-safety-driven approach that would likely be viewed favorably by advocates for stronger screening in child care. The bill also appears designed to reduce administrative ambiguity by specifying timelines, appeal rights, and renewal exceptions for continuously screened individuals.
The main points of potential contention are the scope and cost of the expanded screening requirements, the use of fingerprint-based checks, and the administrative burden on child care providers and applicants. Child care operators may view the mandatory checks, periodic updates, and foreign-residence clearance requirements as costly or time-consuming, even though the bill bars passing the direct cost to workers. Individuals with older, expunged, or set-aside convictions may also be affected by the eligibility rules and redetermination process, though the bill explicitly protects expunged or set-aside records from being used as disqualifiers. No recorded committee debate or vote history was provided, so these concerns are inferred from the bill’s provisions rather than from documented opposition.