At least 1 safety, health violation found at 96 percent of US day cares visited by feds

WASHINGTON, D.C. — From knives accessible to children to employees who never passed background checks, federal investigators found health and/or safety violations at almost every U.S. day care that they visited recently.

A bottle of liquor within reach of children at an unnamed Florida child care center and mold at a Pennsylvania facility were just some of the conditions found during the federal auditor’s surprise inspections.%

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In 96 percent of the on-site visits to child care centers, the inspector general found at least one health and/or safety violation. All 20 sites visited in Florida had problems.

“Parents have a lot on their plate, and when you see some of the concerns we've identified, we got to make it better. It's not good enough,” George Nedder, who supervised the investigation, said.

His biggest concern from the visits was the lack of background checks for day care workers. He said at the majority of places inspected, no background checks had been completed whatsoever.

“We found examples where people didn’t have background checks and had access to the kids all day,” Nedder said.

In 2014, Congress passed a law requiring tougher health and safety standards, but Nedder said the key is enforcing them.

Experts recommend one inspector for every 50 facilities, but none of the states the inspector general looked at came close to that suggestion. For example, Connecticut has one inspector for every 300 day cares.

Cox Media Group