CARE GIVERS FACE FEAR\Some kids may be turned away as limits-easing expires.

Byline: Kermit Pattison Daily News Staff Writer

As a day-care provider playing mom to nearly a dozen children in her Moorpark home, Gail Sharki recoils at the prospect of being forced to reject two of the little ones.

But she fears she may have to do just that unless state legislators renew an experimental program, recently expired, that adds two school-age children to the number permitted in each family day-care home like hers.

"It comes down to picking and choosing who is going to stay in the program," said Sharki. "I detest doing that."

The five-year-old program, which ended Jan. 1, allowed each family day-care home in Ventura County and four other counties to take in two additional school-age children. State lawmakers are now debating whether to renew the program and extend it across all of California.

"It's a partial solution to the child-care problem," said state Sen. Jack O'Connell, who introduced the legislation. "There are no tax dollars at risk. There's no tax increase. It's worked out very well."

State law generally allows a small family day-care home to accept six children and a large day-care home to accept 12.

O'Connell said he has introduced a bill to extend the program to cover all of California's 31,000 licensed family day-care homes. In addition, Assemblyman Tom Bordonaro, R-Paso Robles, has introduced emergency legislation to extend the pilot program until 1997.

"We're trying to take this statewide," O'Connell said. "It may not be for everyone. If it's not, you don't participate."

Supporters say it relieves those in day-care homes of need to choose only preschoolers for care, at full-time rates, and reject school-age children rather than use some legally limited openings for part-time service.

But opponents fear the legislation would undermine care in the state's day-care homes and reduce the number of spots available to infants.

"The bill is deeply flawed," said Karma Ishiura, a Sacramento spokesperson for the California Association for Education of Young Children. "All it's going to do is increase the chance for abuse out there, which is something we can't afford in our child-care system."

Ishiura, chairman of the association's family child-care committee, said the proposed legislation glosses over problems within the home day-care system.

"There's a tremendous lack of quality in the child-care system right now," Ishiura said. "They're saying two more children can't hurt it. They're trying to front-end load it rather than fix the problem."

Small day-care homes with more than two infants and large ones with more than three infants would not be eligible for the additional two spaces, O'Connell said. The bill applies only to day-care programs in homes, not larger day-care centers.

Supporters say the legislation will open up desperately-needed spaces in day-care homes and help keep such programs affordable to parents.

In addition, supporters say the measure gives child-care providers more flexibility and helps them make ends meet.

"We have a real latch-key problem," O'Connell said. "The most recent figures I saw were that roughly 20 percent of our school-age children come home to an empty home."

Pam Waldron, who operated a day-care program out of her Ventura home for 11 years and now works as program manager for the Great Pacific Family Care Contract Network, called the bill an important step.

"I'm real passionate about it because I know it works," she said. "It's just real frustrating to me to think we're going to lose it."

Waldron said the extra two spaces would ensure more day-care slots for parents who need a place to send their kids after school. And she said it would prevent school-age children from being split from their younger siblings in day-care homes.

"The opponents to the bill think people are warehousing all these kids," she said. "The reality is they'r'e not. Some providers use the spaces for their grandchildren, for their own children, or so their children could have friends over."

Unless the program is continued, Sharki fears she may be forced someday to remove some kids from the program as they reach school age.

CAPTION(S):

PHOTO

Photo (color in SIMI edition only) Gail Sharki fears that she will be forced to reject two kids from care in her home. Jeremy Greene/Special to the Daily News