Child Care Licensing Complaints

CCL receives complaints from various sources, such as: parents, family members, other state agencies and child advocates, accreditation organizations, professional boards, and just about anyone who becomes aware of possible regulatory violations within facilities.

Before filing a complaint with the Division of Social Services Child Care Licensing (CCL) staff, you should first consider talking with the facility management. Each facility has a director or administrator who is responsible for the day-to-day operation of the facility. Many situations can be immediately corrected by speaking with the person in charge. Even after filing a complaint, you should consider talking with the facility management to see if you can remedy the situation.

CCL receives complaints by telephone, fax, website, e-mail, regular mail, news media, or through the online form here. 

Each complaint is assessed by a qualified person trained to determine whether the allegations present a situation that may cause substantial harm, minimal harm or no harm (but conditions are not desirable). Each allegation is further assessed to determine whether there is a regulation or law related to the allegation. Based on these assessments, complaints are generally given priorities as follows:

• Immediate Response = imminent harm (same-day response required)
• Priority 1 = not imminent, but possible risk involved (1-day to 3-day response time)
• Priority 2 = no observed or perceived danger (10-day to 15-day response time)
• Priority 3 = NAC or NRS violations noted (30-day response).

Some other factors considered during prioritization include the age of the complaint (for example, if the event occurred more than one year prior to filing the complaint, the priority may be adjusted accordingly); or the relevance of the information given to regulatory violations (if the information is difficult to align with regulations, the priority may be adjusted accordingly).

Investigators use several methods to investigate complaints, such as: conducting interviews; reviewing records, policies and contracts; and making observations of current
conditions and situations. Not all complaints require an on-site visit, some only require
record/document retrieval; others may only require phone contacts to make compliance
decisions; yet others may be resolved by organized contacts with the facility administration, the complainant, and CCL representative. CCL uses whatever methods will result in the most efficient, yet thorough investigation as possible. 

CCL has highly trained and qualified staff to investigate complaints. Investigators are
experienced inspectors with a good understanding of the laws and regulatory requirements and how they relate to the concerns addressed in complaints.

Investigators don’t substantiate whether an event occurred, but rather that there’s violations of laws or regulations. Each allegation is either substantiated (resulting in a Statement of Deficiency with required Plan of Correction and possible Notice of Violation) or not substantiated (no Plan of Correction required and no Notice of Violation). Some violations can lead to provisional licenses, fines, suspension, and revocation. However, CCL does not have the authority to terminate an employee or facility administrator. For further information or to file a complaint, please visit the Child Care Licensing web page.