Governor signs Millett law to ensure kids’ safety at school

Gov. Paul LePage has signed into law a bill from Sen. Rebecca Millett, D-Cape Elizabeth, to ensure all school employees are up-to-date on their background checks and fingerprinting requirements in accordance to state law.

As amended, the new law, LD 1286 “An Act To Facilitate Compliance by School Employees with Criminal History Record Check and Fingerprinting Requirements,” requires school districts to submit a list of all school employees and their date of employment to the Maine Department of Education. When the Department receives the list, it will check whether each person has complied with all necessary criminal history record checks and fingerprinting requirements. If an employee hasn’t complied, the Department must immediately notify the school district.

“When parents send their children to school, they trust that the school administrators and state have done their due diligence to ensure that Maine kids are in safe hands,” said Sen. Millett. “When news broke that so many school employees were operating out of compliance with the law, whether intentional or unintentional, I was appalled and knew I had to act. The Legislature was unanimous in its support of this bill, so I’m glad to see it signed into law.”

Sen. Millett introduced LD 1286 after news reports showed that not all school employees were undergoing background checks before working in Maine schools. Follow-up reporting after the initial incident found the Department didn’t know whether all employees had passed a background check or were property credentialed.

At a 2017 public hearing on LD 1286, Lois Kilby-Chesley, then the President of the Maine Education Association, said that her organization supports “each school completing an audit to be certain that no current employee has remained ‘under the radar’ and failed to complete the background check. For an individual in this scenario, we support requiring this ASAP.”

Under the new law, school districts will begin reporting to the Maine DOE on January 1, 2019, and quarterly thereafter.

Non-emergency laws, of which this is one, will be effective law 90 days after the Maine Legislature adjourns sine die from the special legislative session. There is no set date for the Legislature’s adjournment, but it is expected to return again on July 9 to work on additional legislative business.