We secured and executed a meeting with several representatives from the OCFS from 1PM-2:30PM on Monday January 29th, 2024.  The attendees included Jim Hart, Nora Yates, Erin Cassidy, OCFS representatives from the Buffalo Regional Office, and a representative from the CCRN.  

We discussed the differences in regulatory practices/regulations between NYC and NYS.  We discussed the importance for center-based providers statewide to be provided equal rights and opportunities.  Jim mentioned the public health code was created and implemented before the NYS Constitution which is the reason for the disparity since NYC follows the public health code and NYS follows the constitution.  Jim mentioned there was verbiage in the Social Service Law that limited their ability to adjust certain regulations.  More research will be done on both sides regarding this phenomenon and we will regroup at a later date with our findings.  

We asked the OCFS to publish a similar Providers Bill of Rights that resembles that of NYC.  They were going to consult with their legal department.

We asked for a performance summary card similar to those in NYC to be posted on site rather than the full compliance reports. They were going to review the information posted on performance summary cards and consider this.

We discussed compliance reporting practices including:

Categorizing of regulations by severity
Unfounded complaint investigations
Tenure of compliance history
One-sided reporting
Negative impact on insurance rates/coverage

We asked the OCFS to document on compliance reports the existing regulation categories used for issuing fines to distinguish between Class I, Class II, or Class III violations.  Jim mentioned the category of violation used to be noted on compliance history reports and were removed but can be reinstated.

We asked the OCFS to remove unfounded complaints from public compliance history reports based on pages 2 and 3 of the Bureau of Early Childhood Services Policy Statement form 96-08.  Jim mentioned he believed their was a Consumer Protection Law that required the OCFS to publicly document the result of every investigation conducted whether founded or unfounded.  We question if the result must be made public or if unfounded results can just be reported to the original complainant and remain off compliance history reports.  More research to come on this as well.

We asked the OCFS to reduce the tenure of compliance history from 4 years to 3.  Nora mentioned they were revisiting this and likely reducing the tenure back to 3 years that is legally required effective 2024.

We asked the OCFS to provide an authorized agent of the provider the ability to comment in response to cited violations (like BBB, Google, social media pages, or any audits).  Jim believes there is a Consumer Protection Law that prevents "the regulated" from commentary on their compliance document.  We cited the Right to Reply theory widely used by Google, BBB, social medias, and any business audit that provides an opportunity to reply to comments made about a business.  We asked as a compromise if providers were not provided the opportunity to provide context, if the licensors could potentially provide context next to violations.  They are reviewing their authority to make this change and the logistics of changing the format of the compliance reports to include this section.

We were invited to join an upcoming meeting regarding the childcare insurance crisis with executive members of the OCFS, CCRN, and main insurance carriers for childcare centers. Any providers who have experienced loss of coverage or rate increases from insurance providers over the last 24 months are encouraged to share their stories!  E-mail us at NYSchildcareowners@gmail.com.

In our meeting recap e-mail, we requested that the OCFS appoint an OCFS employee to be a Small Business Liaison for center owners to communicate with directly on a long-term basis and follow similar practices listed in the SAPA Chapter 82 Article 1 Small Business Liaison (https://www.nysenate.gov/legislation/laws/SAP/102-B  

Overall, it was a productive meeting and we were pleasantly surprised to hear that Nora, Jim, and Erin had recently met with another group in Binghamton, NY about similar issues.  They were receptive to our thoughts and feedback and open to discussing our concerns and requests.  Hopefully we will have good news/change/action plans in the next couple updates after following up!