
                         Roanoke Times
                 Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.

DATE: FRIDAY, March 23, 1990                   TAG: 9003232712
SECTION: EDITORIAL                    PAGE: A8   EDITION: METRO 
SOURCE: 
DATELINE:                                 LENGTH: Medium

HISTORY

A BILL passed by the General Assembly to require criminal background checks on workers in church-affiliated day-care centers is good as far as it goes. But it doesn't address the problem that prompted the legislation: There's nothing to stop a pastor with a criminal record from running a child-care center. The law has a gap that could have serious consequences.

A Lynchburg pastor's convictions of sexually abusing young boys in Virginia Beach prompted Sen. Elliot Schewel, D-Lynchburg, to sponsor the bill at the recent assembly session. The Rev. Terence M. Sykes is pastor of Shekijah Preparation Assembly Church, which plans to open a day-care center in Lynchburg. He was convicted in 1983 of three charges of aggravated sexual battery.

Schewel's bill lists a variety of offenses, most of them crimes against children, for which employment at day-care centers is to be denied. The bill, which becomes law July 1, applies to anyone who works or seeks to work at either a licensed center or one with a religious exemption.

The state Department of Social Services already checks criminal backgrounds of people applying for licenses to run non-exempt day-care centers. The only base uncovered is the operator of a church-run center that is exempt from state licensing requirements.

In the case of Shekijah Preparation Assembly, Sykes says he plans to have no contact with the day-care center. It will be on church property but will be operated by private interests, he says. A citizen's report to Lynchburg officials brought to light the pastor's 1983 convictions while he worked as a schoolteacher.

Would a responsible parent leave youngsters in the care of a business run by someone with a record of harming children? Some might ask why a person with such a record would seek to run a business of that nature. Parents who must entrust young lives to the care of others are entitled to enough information about a day-care provider's past to enable them to pose that question.

by CNB