Forum aimed at improving kids’ lives

Posted on October 9, 2009 at 10:04 am by Webmaster

Categories: Children's Campaign News

Date Published: 10/07/2009

Veronica Bishop, who works with children at her church, went to the Children’s Campaign’s town-hall meeting Tuesday night because she wanted to hear what was being said about children.

What she heard and what she saw were a lot of people talking on behalf of children, concerned about the future and ready to stand up to take action.

A crowd of nearly 150 people attended the meeting organized by Children’s Campaign Inc., an organization devoted to making children’s issues a legislative priority. Topics of interest include health care, protection, early education, after-school programs and juvenile justice.

Experts in their fields, like Cassandra Jenkins, a juvenile justice consultant, were able to give perspective about statistics reported in Florida and Leon County, like the prisons’ numbers going up while graduation rates go down.

“Talk is cheap; our children need our help,” Jenkins said to the crowd at Bethel AME Church.

Kay Casey saw the event as “kind of like preaching to the choir but necessary to identify the issues.”

“This is more of a pep rally. Now, I want to see solutions,” she said.

Tallahassee Democrat Executive Editor Bob Gabordi, who served as moderator, posed to the audience the question of what should be done in the community to benefit children.

Larry DiPietro said that Tallahassee residents have the luxury of being in the state capital where they can make noise to lobbyists and members of the Legislature.

“They will listen, and they will take your phone calls,” he said.

“Besides just getting angry, each one of us can get friends to make a phone call. We can’t be overwhelmed to write a letter, pick up a phone or send an e-mail,” Children First Executive Director Christina Spudeas said.

At the end of the night, Bishop said she was very enlightened by what was said, but it was what PACE School student Patrecia Murray said that brought her to tears and ready to go back to her church and make a change.

“What we need is confidence, motivation and activities that will keep kids striving for excellence,” Patrecia said on behalf of all children. “We aren’t getting any younger. I am getting older every day. I need it so I can make it, right now.”

Source: Tallahassee Democrat

Town hall meeting to focus on welfare of children

Posted on October 2, 2009 at 10:46 am by Webmaster

Categories: Children's Campaign News

Date Published: 10/01/2009

Residents in Miami, Orlando, Melbourne and Jacksonville have had their opportunity to speak up on children’s issues. Now it’s Tallahassee’s turn.

The Children’s Campaign’s Pasta With a Purpose dinner and town hall meeting will be held Tuesday at 6 p.m. at Bethel AME Church, 501 W. Orange Ave.

Roy Miller, president and founder of Children’s Campaign Inc., an organization devoted to making children’s issues a legislative priority, has held events like this around the state to raise awareness on important concerns.

He said people often have high interest β€” but lack information β€” in issues about children.

“We are trying to raise those content levels. We want to let voters know what information they are and are not getting,” Miller said.

At the town hall meeting moderated by Tallahassee Democrat Executive Editor Bob Gabordi, featured speakers and panelists will be leading the discussion on issues such as child health, protection, early learning, before- and after-school programs and juvenile justice.

“We have a unique, special responsibility in Tallahassee to have our voices heard,” Gabordi said. “People need to hear voices of parents.”

The speakers are engaged citizens, said Miller, with a variety of backgrounds.

“They know their community and have demonstrated a history of seeing the big picture,” Miller added.

The goal is to educate the public, not merely the “children’s choir,” who will then go to policymakers to make a change on important issues.

“As a mother, woman and citizen I think it’s time for a broader community to speak about issues,” attorney and panelist Martha Barnett said.

“The action or lack of action impacts a lot,” said Linda Alexionok, executive director of the Children’s Campaign. “This event will bring people together and hear each others’ point of view.”

“People think all is well out there, but there are a whole lot of kids not faring so well,” Miller said. “Those people need a reality check.”

Source: Tallahassee.com

When felons care for kids

Posted on October 2, 2009 at 9:33 am by Webmaster

Categories: Children's Campaign News

Date Published: 09/25/2009

Thousands of people with criminal pasts that include violent felonies and hurting children have been hired to work in Florida’s child care centers over the past two decades, a Sun Sentinel investigation has found.

In October, a baby suffered severe burns at a Lauderhill day care while under the watch of a woman on felony probation who was working without a background check.

Tia Porter’s son, Robert, was severely burned at a Lauderhill day care last October. (Mike Stocker, Sun Sentinel) In Central Florida, a toddler nearly died after being left in a sweltering van by a day care employee whose lengthy theft record should have barred her from working at the center.
And in West Palm Beach, an employee worked at a YMCA for two months before a background screening revealed he was facing child sex charges in California.

Florida law requires criminal background checks for child care employees β€” but allows them to begin work before screening is complete. Once the results are in, a process that can take months, people barred from working with children because of a criminal record can still qualify by obtaining an exemption finding that they have been rehabilitated.

The law, along with screening failures, has opened the door for rapists, pedophiles and even killers to work in child care, the Sun Sentinel found. And parents have no way of knowing if felons are caring for their children.

“It’s ridiculous to even think about it, and it’s scary,” said Karen Gievers, a Tallahassee lawyer and child advocate. “If you’ve got people involved in criminal acts with children, it’s absolutely clear that information should be known before you put that person with children.”

The Sun Sentinel obtained a statewide database of background screenings since 1985 that shows at least 2,400 people were already employed in child care before checks turned up their criminal records. A Tampa man had this disturbing note in his screening record: “EVIL DUDE β€”RAPE+KIDNAP+SEX ASLT.”

Another 2,900 people with criminal pasts were cleared for day care work through exemptions, though some had been found guilty of crimes including child abuse, kidnapping and murder.

“It’s totally unacceptable. Obviously, this has become a huge loophole that needs to be closed,” said Nan Rich of Weston, vice chairwoman of the Florida Senate’s Children, Families and Elder Affairs committee. “From what you’ve found, we’ve allowed people who have committed child abuse or molested kids to be among our children.”

When he was 3, Nicholas Bradshaw nearly died after being left in a sweltering van by an Ocala day care worker who never should have working there. More photos (Gary W. Green, Orlando Sentinel) George Sheldon, head of the state Department of Children & Families, said the Sun Sentinel identified troubling problems requiring reforms.
“We’ve got to do a much better job than what we’re currently doing,” he said. “We have a serious responsibility to protect kids.”

Hire first, check later

Florida’s flawed background screening system grew out of a child care scandal in the 1980s.

Frank Fuster, of Miami, was convicted of sexually abusing more than a dozen children at a day care in his Country Walk home and is serving life in prison. Fuster’s record for manslaughter and child molestation came to light only after the scandal broke.

Before that Florida had no consistent background checks. A law passed in 1985 bars people with certain criminal records from “positions of trust” like jobs in day care unless they obtain an exemption.

Under the law, employees undergo a statewide and national FBI criminal record check that must begin within 10 days after they start working.

It can take as little as 24 hours to get results if fingerprints are submitted electronically. But as of last year, more than half the people screened for day care jobs in Florida had their fingerprints inked onto cards and sent by mail, a process that takes six weeks or longer.

“All this time these people are working,” said Sandy Pillar, who tracks screenings at DCF. “We’ve had people working in child care who were pedophiles.”

A bill filed this year in the Legislature would have required electronic fingerprint submission for all child care employees, but it failed.

Children in voluntary pre-kindergarten programs are better protected because employees are covered under a newer law and must pass a background check before working.

Florida has more than 50,000 day care workers. About 4 percent fail the background check and must be removed or apply for an exemption. Day care operators are free to wait for the screening results on new hires, but many do not.

It took six weeks to unearth pending child molestation charges in California against Keith Rodrigues, an employee at a skate park operated by the YMCA of the Palm Beaches.

At a child’s birthday party near San Francisco, Rodrigues fondled a 12-year-old girl and was caught watching a 4-year-old boy shower, according to a police report.

While awaiting trial in 2003, Rodrigues was hired at the West Palm Beach skate park.

“Background check not pretty,” someone scribbled in his screening file after he was already on the job.

The YMCA fired Rodrigues, and he is now a registered sex offender.

“These are things we know can happen all the time,” said Mike Green, executive director of the YMCA. “If it takes [weeks] to get a report back from the FBI, that is a concern.”

Screening problems common

In Florida, parents can check inspection records to see how a day care center rates in everything from safety hazards to food preparation β€” but they have no way of knowing the backgrounds of the employees who care for their children. Personnel records are not public.

State inspection data show that omissions and errors in the employee screening process are rife. Day care operators must check the backgrounds of new hires and re-screen employees every five years or if they stop working for longer than 90 days.

Lack of proof that employee background checks have been made are among the most common violations at day care centers throughout Florida, a Sun Sentinel analysis of inspection data over the past five years found.

Yet even when children are put in the care of serious offenders, day cares typically receive only a small fine.

Broward County in 2004 adopted stricter standards than the state, requiring a background check be completed before a child care employee starts work. But screening violations have continued by the hundreds.

The Showers of Blessings Christian Academy in Fort Lauderdale had two employees working with criminal records, a March 2006 inspection found. One was sent home and the other was “called and told not to come in.” The day care was fined $250.

With a starting pay of only about $8 an hour, the child care industry sometimes attracts people with criminal pasts, day care operators said. Turnover can be high, and filling vacancies quickly is critical to maintaining legally required staff-to-children ratios.

Last year, the Uncle Charles Learning Center in Lauderhill hired Shakeyda Kent without checking her background. She was on probation for two felony convictions of driving with a suspended license, had pleaded no contest to marijuana possession and was arrested but not prosecuted for grand theft, records show.

Kent was one of two employees supervising seven infants last October, when 8-month-old Robert Porter crawled away, pulled the cord of a bottle warmer and spilled scalding water on his head.

The day care didn’t screen Kent until five days later. It was the center’s fourth background screening violation in six months.

The day care got a $500 fine. Little Robert Porter spent eight days at Plantation General Hospital with burns to his face and head.

“It was painful, very painful,” said his mother, Tia Porter, an employee at a Checkers restaurant. “He wouldn’t eat for the eight days he was in the hospital, barely drank a milk bottle.”

Porter has a pending lawsuit against Uncle Charles. The day care surrendered its license and closed April 30 following more violations.

The center’s former owner, Tracye Wilkerson, of Plantation, said she was “not interested in talking.” Kent did not respond to messages seeking comment.

Exemptions for murder

People with disqualifying criminal records can never be a public school teacher or even a bail bondsman in Florida. But they can still get jobs in child care.

Exemptions are possible for any misdemeanor, regardless of how recent, and felonies committed more than three years earlier. Crimes committed by people granted exemptions include aggravated assault, arson, sexual battery, aggravated child abuse, contributing to the delinquency of a minor and domestic violence.

Kenneth Scurry is one of 15 murderers granted a child care exemption, the Sun Sentinel found. In 1984, Scurry drove to a Fort Myers convenience store with an accomplice, who shot and killed a clerk and made off with $40, court records say. Scurry was sent to prison for 30 years but was released in 1997 after his sentence was reduced.

Scurry’s wife Lula applied to run a day care from their home in 2005 but could not get a license because of her husband’s record.

In his exemption request, Kenneth Scurry said he was “a monster during that time of his life” but downplayed his role in the holdup. DCF twice turned him down. Scurry won on appeal in court after a judge found “clear and overwhelming evidence” he was rehabilitated.

“My husband has changed his life,” Lula Scurry, who now runs the Ark of Safety day care in Fort Myers, said in an interview.

Precious Kidz, Inc. in Pompano Beach hired convicted felon Michelle Rush last year after she got an exemption. Rush had gone to prison three times for grand theft, burglary and possession of a counterfeit bill. “I don’t think this is a great history,” acknowledged day care director Cynthia Sheppard, who said Rush nonetheless had proven to be an excellent employee. “She’s a very gentle person, very loving to the children.”

Some child advocates say loopholes in the law are too dangerous and must be eliminated.

“Common sense says there is no substitute for putting children in anything but a safe environment,” said Linda Alexionok, executive director of the Children’s Campaign, a child advocacy group in Tallahassee. “No parent should ever, ever have to be worried about that.”

Source: Sun-Sentinel