By Victor Skinner | The Center Square contributor
(The Center Square) – Some Pennsylvania businesses and agencies that provide services for minors now have more flexibility in hiring employees thanks to legislation recently approved by the General Assembly.
House Bill 764, sponsored by Rep. Brett Miller, R-Lancaster, eliminated a disparity between licensed child care centers and other businesses servicing minors in regards to criminal background checks for prospective employees.
The bill, signed into law last week by Gov. Tom Wolf, provides a 45-day window for employers to hire employees working with children while the results of three required background checks are processed by state and federal agencies.
“As employers across Pennsylvania are already struggling to find enough people to hire, those offering full-time or seasonal employment to those working with minors are being hit doubly hard,” Miller said. “This legislation would significantly help affected businesses and public and private agencies to bring on the full-time and seasonal employees they need and help college-age and teen workers to actually be able to start work and earn a paycheck.”
Act 47 of 2019 reduced the provisional hiring window for licensed child care providers from 90 days to 45 days but eliminated the same for employers who hire and supervise employees or volunteers in direct contact with children.
The change reportedly resulted in hiring struggles for many agencies and other public and private employers because required background checks, specifically a FBI fingerprint check, can take weeks to return. Employers such as summer camps, pools, public parks, athletic leagues, boys and girls clubs and others complained that prospective employees often sought employment elsewhere during the wait.
“This is a substantial challenge for all employers because many workers are understandably reluctant to forfeit a significant portion of their summer employment period waiting on the results of their FBI background check,” Miller said. “This issue was brought to my attention by an employer in my district who hires many seasonal employees. Between this … onerous regulation and difficulties in hiring due to the pandemic, many small businesses are facing continuing challenges in finding employees to fill necessary positions.”
HB 764, now Act 12, includes several safeguards in place for child care providers to ensure those hired to work with children are closely supervised during the provisional period.
The safeguards require employers or those tasked with hiring to have “no knowledge of information pertaining to the applicant which would disqualify him from employment,” as well as a written statement from the applicant asserting the same. Disqualifying information includes convictions for homicide, assault, stalking, kidnapping, unlawful restraint, rape, indecent exposure, incest and numerous crimes involving children.
The law requires employers to immediately terminate employment if those crimes turn up in background checks.
Act 12 also stipulates “the employer, administrator, supervisor or other person responsible for employment decisions requires that the applicant not be permitted to work alone with children and that the applicant work in the immediate vicinity of a permanent employee” until cleared by the background checks.
