Texas to get new tools to crack down on unsafe day cares

The Texas Health and Human Services Commission will soon have more tools to crack down on unsafe day cares thanks to a bill approved Monday night by the Texas House.

Senate Bill 568 by Sen. Joan Huffman, R-Houston, increases fines the state can levy on child care centers and homes that violate safety rules.

Rep. Greg Bonnen, R-Friendswood, who carried the bill in the House, said it "strengthens the Health and Human Services Commission's regulations as they pertain to child care facilities in order to protect children ... and to ensure that our facilities are safe and held responsible."

An amendment by Rep. James Frank, R-Wichita Falls, which was approved Monday without objection, will require the agency to report back in two years on the effect that the new regulatory tools have on the availability and affordability of child care in Texas.

The bill will now head back to the Senate, which previously approved it on a 30-1 vote; senators have the option of accepting the Frank amendment or negotiating a compromise between the two versions before it heads to Gov. Greg Abbott's desk.

The bill is the second to be approved by both chambers of the Legislature that deals with issues raised in the American-Statesman's investigative series "Unwatched," which found that more than 88 children died of abuse or neglect in Texas day cares over the previous decade, that an additional 450 were sexually abused and that the state often fails to curb the behavior of day care operators that rack up scores of rules violations.

The other bill, SB 708 by Sen. Judith Zaffirini, D-Laredo, was approved by the House last week and would require the state to collect data on day care injury rates in relation to classroom sizes. Studies in other states have shown a strong link between child injuries and deaths and large day care classrooms, and Texas' regulations on how many kids a caregiver can look after are among the most lax in the nation. Child safety advocates hope that the new data will demonstrate how Texas' rules hurt children and lead the state to revise them.

Two other day care safety bills have been approved by the Senate and are scheduled to come to the House on Tuesday. To become law, the bills would need to be taken up by lawmakers before midnight, the House deadline for passing most legislation this session.

SB 569, also from Huffman, would increase regulations on listed family homes, small but legal day care operations that are not regularly inspected by the state.

SB 706 by Sen. Kirk Watson, D-Austin, would reestablish an investigative unit that, from 2013 until it was shut down by the Health and Human Services Commission in 2017, searched for so-called illegal day cares, which are in-home day cares that are run by people who do not tell the state about their business and that are considered to be the most dangerous type of child care.