Parents who need child care services select from different types of child care providers: in-home care, in which a child is cared for by a provider such as an au pair or nanny in the child’s home; family child care or group home care, in which the child is cared for in a private residence other than the child’s home; and center care, in which a child is cared for by providers in a nonresidential setting, such as in a church, school, or business. Additionally, care can be provided by someone related to the child other than the parents, such as grandparents, aunts, uncles, or siblings, which is referred to as relative care. See table 1. In general, states and localities are responsible for regulating child care providers and carry out this responsibility by (1) establishing specific requirements that regulated child care providers must comply with in order to legally operate; and (2) enforcing these requirements through activities conducted by state licensing offices. The stringency of the requirements with which providers must comply and the scope and intensity of state enforcement activities differ among the provider types within states as well as among states overall. Many states do not regulate a significant number of providers. This is because, given the competing priorities for limited funds as well as other factors, states must make choices about the extent to which they can conduct enforcement activities and the types of providers to which these activities will apply. State policies regarding child care regulation are also influenced by the supply of child care and its cost to parents. Research has shown that some types of child care regulation may increase the cost of doing business for providers, particularly for small providers like family and group homes. Federal laws regulate the employment of sex offenders at federal child care facilities, and widely divergent laws govern state child care facilities, especially with regard to licensing requirements and penalties. We did not analyze state regulations or policies, nor any laws, regulations, or policies at the local level. In addition, the scope of this review did not include a review of whether these laws were effectively enforced. For a summary of laws related to the employment of sex offenders at child care facilities in all 50 states, see appendix I. Federal Laws. The National Child Protection Law of 1993 requires the Department of Justice to conduct a criminal-history check at the request of child care facilities or other youth-serving organizations. This check allows for a fingerprint-based criminal-history search of the FBI’s National Crime Information Center database. However, federal law does not require child care facilities to use this service unless the facility is federally owned or operated (or operated under a federal contract). Other laws governing the employment of sex offenders relate to facilities that receive federal grants. For example, Head Start grantees must either conduct a state or national criminal record check before hiring any employee, depending on state law requirements. Grantees are prohibited from permanently hiring an individual until these checks h ave been performed, although they may conditionally hire an individual if it isnot feasible to perform a preemployment check. Employees are also required to sign a declaration to all pending and prior criminal arrests and ith any charges related to child sexual abuse and their disposition, along w convictions related to other forms of child abuse and neglect and convictions of violent felonies. Grantees are then required to determine whether the individual is fit for employment based upon his or her criminal charge or conviction. In addition to requirements for Head Start grantees, CCDF requires that states certify to the federal government that they have requirements in effect to protect the health and safety of children in child care facilities who are subsidized with these funds. However, the block grant does not dictate to states the specificity, stringency, or number of requirements they must have or the manner in which they should enforce them. 45 C.F.R. § 98.41. child care facility. Nine additional states more narrowly impose such a prohibition on offenders whose victims were minors. Four states also specifically prohibit sex offenders from residing at a facility that provides child care services. Criminal-History Check Requirements. Although it is not always clear whether criminal-history checks need to be completed prior to employment, all 50 states require such checks for owners and employees of licensed child care facilities. However, the requirements for licensing vary widely. Only 3 states appear to require criminal-history checks for all licensed and unlicensed child care facilities, while 11 states require that all facilities that receive state or federal funds perform these checks. In addition, 23 states require criminal-history checks for adult residents at licensed child care or group home facilities. Fourteen states and the District of Columbia specifically require checks for volunteers at licensed childcare facilities, and six states specifically require criminal-history checks for contractors. Finally, several states exempt child care facilities associated with schools or religious organizations from the licensing or criminal-history check requirements. Method for Conducting Criminal-History Checks. The vast majority of states require that criminal-history checks for employees and other staff be fingerprint-based and be conducted in both national and state databases, but many do not specify that the checks must be completed prior to an employee’s start date. In four states, statutes require criminal- history checks, but they do not specify the use of either national or state databases. In addition, five states limit the check to state databases, while four states require national database checks only if the employee or applicant has not been a resident of the state for a specified period of time. Four states require by statute that criminal-history checks be performed at specified intervals. Penalties for violations. All 50 states provide some type of penalty for violating requirements related to the employment of sex offenders, but these penalties vary widely. For example, 34 states and the District of Columbia attach criminal penalties to licensing requirement violations, failure of an owner or employee to disclose criminal-history information, or failure to perform criminal-history checks. In 29 states, violation of licensing requirements and failure to perform criminal-history checks may result in civil penalties or fines, ranging from $5 per violation to $10,000 per violation. We did not assess the prevalence of sex offenders working or residing at child care facilities; our 10 cases do provide examples of sex offenders who gained access to such facilities as maintenance workers, spouses or friends of providers, a cafeteria worker, and a carpenter. Seven of these cases involve offenders who previously targeted children, and in at least 3 of the cases, the offenders used their access to children at the child care facility to offend again. As discussed below, we identified instances of relatives and acquaintances who knowingly hired offenders to work at child care facilities and facilities that unknowingly hired offenders because they did not perform preemployment criminal-history checks. Our investigation also found instances where child care facilities employing sex offenders operated without licenses or received federal funds. Relatives or Acquaintances Knowingly Provided Sex Offenders Access to Child Care Facilities. In at least 7 of our 10 cases, sex offenders were hired or allowed to reside at both licensed and unlicensed facilities by relatives or acquaintances who were aware of the offenders’ previous offenses. As shown in the cases, the regulatory consequences for allowing a sex offender to have access to a child care facility differ widely, ranging from, for example, no action being taken to suspension of a child care license to a misdemeanor charge for providing child care services in a home where a sex offender resides. Examples from our case studies include the following:  Operators of a licensed child care facility in the District of Columbia hired their son in April 2008 as an after-hours janitor even though he had been convicted for attempting to sexually abuse a very young girl. The terms of the offender’s parole and District of Columbia law prohibited him from being employed at a child care facility. After interviewing the child care provider, we confirmed that the offender was working at the facility in November 2010. The offender’s father told us that employing his son to work at the child care facility was not a cause for concern, even though he was a convicted sex offender; he also stated that his son’s employment was approved by his probation officer and that he only worked after the school was closed. We referred the case to the Metropolitan Police Department, Sex Offender Registry Unit, who told us that they could not take action against the offender because he was no longer under court supervision and the restrictions of his parole no longer applied. We then referred the matter to the Office of the State Superintendent of Education, the office responsible for licensing child care facilities in the District of Columbia. In March 2011, the office required the owners to certify that they had terminated their son’s employment and notify him that he was prohibited from visiting the child care facility, in order to maintain their license. As of March 21, 2011, the office was still investigating the matter.  An Illinois woman allowed her husband to reside at her unlicensed home-based child care facility even though he had prior convictions for sexual assault and abuse. In Illinois, sex offenders are not allowed to be present at any child care facility. Over a 6-year period, the offender sexually molested one of the children under his wife’s care. He was sentenced to life in prison and is currently incarcerated. Prosecutors told us that they could not gather enough evidence to prosecute the wife.  A Kentucky owner of a licensed child care facility hired a cafeteria worker even though she knew that he had been convicted of sexual abuse in the first degree, because she wanted to help him. Kentucky prohibits child care facilities from hiring sex offenders for any position involving direct contact with minors. A series of anonymous tips led to an investigation of the child care facility, which resulted in a suspension of her license and an order to cease operations. She revoked her right to appeal the suspension.  A woman in North Carolina allowed her husband and his son, both of whom were convicted for taking indecent liberties with a minor, to reside in a house where she was providing child care.