Daycares to create customized emergency plans

Abby Cohen from the National Child Care Information Center is on island to talk to both the Department of Community and Cultural Affairs and various childcare providers about emergency planning.

Cohen and heads of the childcare program talked on Wednesday about what the agency would do if there is an emergency situation.

“We talked about what the lead agency would do should an emergency disaster strikes, to make sure that the childcare program is still operating,” Cohen said.

Yesterday, Cohen met with various childcare providers, clueing them in on how to go about making a customized emergency plan for their respective daycares.

She said that the childcare licensing program being implemented here requires childcare providers to have an emergency plan. However “the emergency plan does not specify what the plan should look like or how it should be done.”

Checklists on emergency planning were issued to childcare providers giving them the opportunity to customize their own emergency plan according to their specifications.

Cohen provided examples of effective emergency plans from childcare providers in various states in the US.

“Its different when you’re talking with a big agency [DCCA] and learning about how they keep functioning and continuing to make sure that the providers get paid or make sure that when an emergency disaster strikes, how do they go out and make sure [that] everybody is okay, versus talking to the childcare providers,” Cohen said.

She said she is helping childcare providers identify what they might need in their emergency plans.

“I’m actually helping them decide what their emergency plans could look like, but they still have the opportunity in the future to say how they really want it to look like,” Cohen said.

According to Cohen, DCCA can help “specify a lot of things [in the emergency plans] but they do not have them in their regulations right now. All they have is that these childcare providers must have an emergency plan.”

She admitted that she herself was not clear because she only had one version of the regulations, while another one states that parents have to be notified about what the emergency plan is.

DCCA Melvin Faisao said there was indeed a previous regulation in place and a subsequent one that went into effect, which is already printed in the administrative code under the law revision.

“We have identified that the law revision made an oversight and placed the administrative code under the Division of Youth Services when it was supposed to be under the childcare licensing program,” Faisao said.

He said that the whole idea of Cohen coming to Saipan and meeting with the department and childcare providers is to assist in rectifying missing “pertinent” information in DCCA’s regulations.

“The idea is to improve on what’s already there,” Cohen said.

“Child care providers need to know what kinds of supplies are needed should a natural disaster strikes, or procedures to take, and they also need to be aware of what kind of impact a natural disaster would have on a child,” she said.

Cohen also shared that it would be wise if the department had a provision that states their authority to waive certain requirements for childcare providers if there is an emergency.

“The provision would be a good thing because if there is a disaster of some kind and you might need to start up childcare right away. The department would have the authority to waive certain requirements to open up childcare providers in emergency situations,” Cohen said.

Faisao said that DCCA already has a provisional licensing; however, it does not “exactly spell out [that] we could grant you a provisional license in the event of an emergency. So that’s when Ms. Cohen came in and shared with us that idea.”

Faisao said that Cohen’s visit would improve the operation of the childcare program.

“Ms. Cohen shared with us resource information that we believe will become viable to safety and hazard issues,” Faisao said.

Cohen, who works part-time at the Region IX State Technical Assistance Specialist for the NCCIC, said that because the CNMI receives childcare development fund grants, it is her job to visit the island and provide technical assistance and make sure that the new lead agency and childcare providers are complying with what is required by the federal government.