Investigations spell more trouble for Head Start

By Timothy Pratt

Monday, March 21, 2005 | 11:26 a.m.

Children appear to have been left in harm's way at two Head Start centers in the Las Vegas Valley recently, leading a top federal official to decry what she said was a pattern of negligence at the nonprofit organization running the centers.

County and state licensing agencies also investigated the two Head Start centers last week after mothers complained about the incidents involving their children, officials said.

In one of the cases, a 2-year-old girl was left unsupervised for about 15 minutes in a hallway about 10 feet from a door that leads to the street. In the other, a 17-month-old girl was bitten in the face by another child three times. The other child previously had been violent toward other children, the injured girl's mother said.

The incidents, and the way they were dealt with by the Economic Opportunity Board, the nonprofit organization that oversees the Head Start program in the valley, are further evidence of the shoddy work that led the federal government to decide in January to take away the organization's funding for the program, said Windy Hill, associate commissioner for the Head Start bureau.

"This brings us back to our findings about the agency's ability to safeguard not just federal funds, but the children," Hill said.

"It is further documentation and evidence that there are real problems with this agency and the delivery of its services."

Further, Hill said, one of the two incidents occurred at a center which had already been the site of problems in January, and a plan to fix those problems had been drafted after those prior problems.

The EOB is appealing the federal government's decision to take the Head Start program away. The appeal could take six months or more to resolve, Hill said. She said the latest incidents, together with three incidents that occurred in January, would be made known during an upcoming but as-yet- unscheduled hearing that is part of the review.

In an earlier interview about the decision to take the program away from the EOB with Sen. John Ensign, R-Nev., the senator said that organizations should not be allowed to manage Head Start centers during the appeal process.

"We're looking at fixing this legislatively," he said.

"In the future, with an entity not being fiscally responsible, there should be another agency to come in and take it over during the appeal."

Meanwhile, Hill said she was frustrated and anxious about possible harm to any of the nearly 1,800 children in the program.

"We certainly want to have the agency have the possibility to defend themselves, but at the same time we know what conditions are there," she said.

As the flap about the most recent problems in Southern Nevada's Head Start program occurred last week, the federal Government Accountability Office released a report noting a series of problems nationwide in the administration of Head Start programs and a lack of federal oversight.

In one of the two local cases in question, Latreve Lewis said her 2-year-old girl was left unsupervised for 15 minutes in a hallway 10 feet from a door leading out of the Henderson Head Start and Early Head Start center, 180 N. Westminster Way, near Major Avenue and Boulder Highway. Lewis said she was not told what had happened until more than 24 hours later. The incident occurred Thursday, she said.

If those events occurred, then at least two policies were violated, Mary Twitty, interim executive director of the EOB, said. Twitty was brought in to run the organization in recent months while it responds to the Head Start's decision and negative reviews from other state and federal funding agencies.

She said that if any employees are found to have violated policy in the incidents, one possible outcome could be that those people would be fired.

"If somebody didn't abide by policy, we don't tolerate it," Twitty said.

"We have never put children at risk."

Lewis said she was not told about what happened to her daughter, Latriece, until Friday just before 4 p.m. She said she received a call on her cell phone saying "there was an incident" that had occurred the day before at 10:30 a.m., when her daughter somehow got out of the classroom.

She said she got so upset that she hung up the phone shortly thereafter and never heard the details of the incident.

Twitty said all incidents compromising a child's safety must be reported to parents "immediately," meaning the delayed call violated that policy.

Lewis said she was called to a meeting Monday where she was told that her daughter was alone about 15 minutes, in a hallway about 10 feet from a door that leads outside.

She also said she had not received what is known as an "incident report" by Friday night.

Twitty said it is EOB policy to issue such reports by the end of the day on which incidents occur, or by the next day if necessary.

Lewis said the chain of events has upset her and that she thinks the lag in notifying her and the lack of a written report means "they're hiding something."

She said she has not taken her daughter back to the center since Thursday and is afraid for her daughter's safety. At the same time, she said, she cannot take more time off from her $9.50 an hour job at Wal-Mart than she already has, and is hard-pressed to find another source of child care.

Paula Hawkins, chief of the bureau of services for child care, said her agency concluded an investigation into the incident in Henderson late last week and confirmed that Lewis' daughter was left unsupervised for 15 minutes.

She said the center would be reviewing its practices so that such an incident doesn't occur again.

In the second case, Pam Henry said a 17-month-old girl she is in the process of adopting was bitten in the face by another child three times Friday at the Spring Valley Learning Center, 2845 Mohawk St., near Lindell Road and Sahara Avenue. Henry says she was told four teachers were nearby when the toddler was bitten.

Henry said she also was told the child who attacked her foster daughter had a history of being violent with other children at the center and was never assessed to determine the causes of that violence -- until now.

Twitty said if that was true, it would also be against Head Start policy.

Henry said she was told by Clark County Child Care Licensing personnel that her case would also be investigated this week.

Henry -- who once was the chairwoman of the Head Start Policy Council, a group of parents and community members that helps guide the program's policy -- said she wanted to know how four teachers could have let her daughter endure three bites to her face.

She also wanted to know why the child who bit her daughter hadn't been assessed earlier to determine possible courses of action in curbing his violence.

Twitty said private consultants hired by EOB should do psychological assessments after every violent incident.

Nancy Hancock, management analyst at the county's department of business license -- which oversees child care licensing -- confirmed that Henry contacted the department and an investigation would be done this week.

The Head Start centers in the Las Vegas Valley are variously under the jurisdiction of the state, county and the city of Las Vegas.

Hill, the federal official, sent the Sun documents that show three earlier incidents took place on Jan. 3, 4 and 10 at the Henderson center -- including one in which a child somehow left a classroom and wound up in a parking lot.

After the EOB reported the first two incidents to the federal agency, the nonprofit organization sent a series of documents to the federal agency outlining policies that would prevent these types of problems from happening again.

It was also agreed that any future incidents would be immediately reported to the federal agency.

Then the agency sent investigators to the center Feb. 1 and discovered that a third incident had occurred Jan. 10 -- and the EOB had failed to report it.

Similarly, last week's problems were also not reported.

"The EOB is an agency we have concerns about and given those concerns and findings the expectation as the funding agency is that they let us know if there is an incident," Hill said.

Hill said she had not yet been given a written report on last week's problems. After seeing something in writing, she said her agency would decide what course of action to take -- but noted that the appeal process limits her choices.

She could ask for another correction plan, she said, "but the problem is it keeps happening."

Meanwhile, she said, she is concerned for the children's safety.

"I've always been concerned about whether ... issues with the agency would result in worsening conditions for the children in the program."