State promotes new criminal background checks for caregivers

If you're applying for a job at a hospital, child care center or home health agency, don't be surprised if you're asked for your fingerprints and a photograph.

Despite opposition from privacy advocates, state lawmakers and Gov. Dayton this year enacted legislation that overhauls Minnesota's criminal background check system for a variety of caregivers. The Department of Human Services is now starting to help employers prepare for the change. The department says the new system will be more efficient for workers, employers, and the state.

If you have a common last name, like Smith, Abdi, or Olson, and you're applying for a job as a nurse or child care worker, there's a chance your legally-required criminal look-back check could get hung up in a shuffle of paperwork. That's because the current system relies primarily on names and dates of birth to identify applicants.

The new system will be a lot more efficient because it will use fingerprints instead, says Lucinda Jesson, DHS commissioner. "We're going to get more timely results, which is good for employees, good for employers, but mostly because they're more accurate, it's good for vulnerable children and adults all around our state."

The state performs about 275,000 background studies per year. Jesson expects that number to drop by two-thirds with the new system because people won't have to undergo a full check each time they change jobs. Instead, employers can do a quick look at a database to see if an applicant has already been cleared.

And Jerry Kerber, DHS inspector general, says the checks will be more accurate. Now, if an employee at a nursing home is convicted of a crime making the worker ineligible for the job, DHS learns about it only if a corrections agent or probation officer tells the agency. The new system will notify DHS automatically.

The department will start training employers on the new system this summer, and fingerprint stations will open around the state between January and April of next year. A $3 million dollar federal grant is covering the implementation costs, and the state will continue to charge a $20 fee per look-back.

"As a previous provider of care, that will help me sleep better at night, that there isn't something hidden going on with one of my current employees that were good last January, but may not be good today," said Doug Beardsley of Care Providers Minnnesota, a trade group for nursing homes and assisted-living facilities. "Without that knowledge, I may have someone working for me caring for people that I don't want caring for people," Beardsley said.

The law implementing the new fingerprint-based system passed both the Minnesota House and Senate unanimously, but not without critics.

A data breach could put the personal information of thousands of people into the hands of criminals, said Teresa Nelson, legal director at the American Civil Liberties Union of Minnesota. "It would be very easy in the future for the government to make changes to policy to make this information widely available to law enforcement or to be retained much more widely," she said. "We've seen that with DNA collection. We've seen that with Social Security numbers."