The Idaho House of Representatives defeated a bill Tuesday to bring Idaho into compliance with federal regulations for child care licensing.

“Idaho is currently out of compliance with the child care block grant,” said Niki Forbing-Orr, Idaho Department of Health and Welfare Public Information Manager. “We are out of compliance because we don’t have the appropriate regulations for background checks.”

This could cost Idaho $2.5 million in federal penalties if they cannot get a bill passed.

“$950,000 will be assessed to the state the first year and $1.6 million the second year,” Forbing-Orr said.

Penalties would be issued by the Administration for Children and Families within the Department of Health and Human Services.

The Child Care and Development Block Grant Act provided federal funding to states for child care subsidies for low-income families. It can be applied within existing state and local child care systems. Reauthorized in November 2014 with bipartisan support, the federal block grant strengthened health and safety requirements for child care providers.

In accordance with the federal grant, House Bill 312 would have required child care owners, operators and employees to complete and pass a more stringent criminal history background check, including fingerprints.

“Federal regulations require a background check to be done once every five years, rather than just once for an employee who works at a daycare facility,” Forbing-Orr said.

All of North Idaho’s representatives voted against the bill. The House voted 44-23 against the legislation sponsored by Rep. Ilana Rubel, D-Boise.

After the bill failed to pass the house, Rep. Paul Amador, R-Coeur d’Alene, met with representatives from the Department of Health and Welfare and the Idaho Association for the Education of Young Children.

“We worked through the bill and will have a new draft to be passed, hopefully, in the future,” Amador said.

The Idaho Panhandle Health District, in conjunction with the Idaho Department of Health and Welfare, currently have 29 criteria for assessing the safety of child care facilities.

“Meeting these new standards will require investments in building both provider and state-level systems with the capacity to deliver, support, and oversee quality programs that support children’s development and learning,” said the First Five Years Fund website, an organization that advocates for equal opportunity for child care and early learning.

“I did vote against the bill, not because of the updates, but because there were quite a few additions to that legislation that would have provided significantly more regulation than the bare minimum,” Amador said.

Amador understood the bill wouldn’t be palatable to Idaho legislators in its original form.

“We’ve got to have a bill that can pass,” Amador said. “I’m working in a proactive way to get it to pass the house.”

Amador said the new draft attempts to efficiently incorporate new regulations.

“Five new criminal offenses preclude someone from working in a childcare setting,” Amador said. “We’ve included those minimum requirements and streamlined the bill.”

“These changes in statute only affect 200 day care and early childhood education facilities,” Amador said. “There are 1,200 total in the state. It is still important. We still want to apply regulations to all of them. At the end of the day it is about child safety.”

“Our program staff did considerable work to get feedback from childcare providers all over the state,” Forbing-Orr said. “The vast majority of childcare providers were in support of this legislation.”