Preparedness for Child Care Providers
Ramsey County: partnering with you to improve our community's child care emergency preparedness.
The State of Minnesota has established new licensing requirements for child care providers. These requirements help improve emergency and disaster preparedness in licensed child care centers and in-home providers across Ramsey County.
The following list of resources will help navigate this new requirement, continue services after a local emergency or disaster and ensure the safety of children in your care.
Preparedness child care licensing rules
Planning guidance and examples
Emergency warnings and notifications
Commonly asked questions
Will you review my plan?
We are unable to review emergency plans for individual centers and providers. We can, however, answer questions and provide planning advice. Please feel free to email us and [email protected] or call 651-266-1020.
How should I coordinate with local response and government before, during and after a disaster?
The creation of emergency plans for your child care business is an important step to insure the safety of your children and staff. It will also impact your ability to recover your business and livelihood after a disaster.
- Be sure to conduct emergency drills to practice your plans.
- These drills will test your plans, allow for improvement and create familiarity and competence among your children and staff during an actual event.
- Practice will lead to greater efficiency and safety in your responses.
- Keep accurate addresses and child/staff numbers on file in the Social Services Department. This allows us to identify that we have a child care facility in the disaster area.
- Call 9-1-1 if there is an immediate danger to life in your family child care program.
- Notify disaster assistance hotlines/help services if you have been unable to get your children safely evacuated or you have children trapped in some way. Do not assume we know that you are in need of assistance. Understand that help may not be immediately available and you will need to continue to protect your children and staff as necessary.
- After all children and staff are safe, begin evaluating the capability of your business to provide its services in the next days and weeks. Contact your insurance agency right away
- Determine the options for continuing or restarting services as soon as possible and communicate that with parents.
Is childcare an important part of disaster recovery?
Child care is a critical component of a communities disaster recovery. Parents can’t work on rebuilding a home and if they don’t have a safe and dependable place to care for their children. Make sure your plans include an understanding of your disaster related insurance and how you will return to operations as quickly and safely as possible after an event.
Additional resources
Specific plan issues
- Sample fire drill record and tip sheet (Washington County)
- Reunification
- Communication (PDF)
- Sheltering-in-place
Training
- Handling Emergencies in Child Care (Sesame Street Communities)
Recovery
- Recovery After Disaster The Family Financial Toolkit
- Business Preparedness and Recovery Planning (FEMA)
- Insurance