Announcement C-20-09-Revised

The Pennsylvania Office of Child Development and Early Learning (OCDEL) Bureau of Certification has released the Announcement C-20-09-Revised, Emergency Temporary Relocation of Facility due to the Governor Issuing a Declaration of Disaster – Specific to Novel Coronavirus (COVID-19) – Revision. This announcement establishes a statewide protocol to manage situations in which a child care facility must relocate operation due to local education agency (LEA) decisions to limit access to their facilities to mitigate the spread of the Novel Coronavirus (COVID-19). This document is specific to child care impacted by displacement through Aug. 30, 2021. This announcement supplements announcement C-17-05, which addressed the process to relocate due to all other emergency or disaster circumstances.

As part of the commonwealth’s response to COVID-19, the Pennsylvania Department of Education (PDE) issued guidance to assist all LEAs with developing and implementing local Health and Safety Plans to mitigate the spread of COVID-19. Health and Safety Plans must consider unique factors of each LEA related to the impacts of COVID-19 and local health conditions. Health and Safety Plans must include a plan to communicate to enrolled families how the LEA will mitigate risk and outline strategies to prevent virus transmission.

PDE’s guidance allows LEAs to consider flexible attendance policies and limitation of additional activities for students and staff as a mitigation strategy to prevent virus transmission and ensure a healthy school environment. As Pennsylvania LEAs and private schools are finalizing and announcing plans for the 2020-21 academic school year, they may announce limitations to other activities that would otherwise normally occur in their buildings or on their campuses. This may result in child care programs who have partnered with LEAs to operate in those spaces to be displaced for the 2020-21 school year and 2021 summer months.

If a child care operator is informed they will be displaced from a LEA building, OCDEL will work with the provider to complete an emergency relocation if they plan to continue operations. This process is outlined within the Announcement C-20-09-Revised, Emergency Temporary Relocation of Facility due to the Governor Issuing a Declaration of Disaster – Specific to Novel Coronavirus (COVID-19) – Revision.