Minnesota Agencies

The governor shall appoint an ombudsperson in the unclassified service to assist family child care providers with licensing, compliance, and other issues facing family child care providers. The ombudsperson must be selected without regard to the person's political affiliation and must have been a licensed family child care provider for at least three years. The ombudsperson shall serve a term of four years, which may be renewed, and may be removed prior to the end of the term for just cause. The ombudsperson must report annually by December 31 to the commissioner and the chairs and ranking minority members of the legislative committees with jurisdiction over child care on the services provided by the ombudsperson to child care providers, including the number and locations of child care providers served and the activities of the ombudsperson in carrying out the duties under this section. The commissioner shall determine the form of the report and may specify additional reporting requirements.

The final report from the Family Child Care Task Force discussed and recommended that the Legislature establish an ombudsperson "who would be charged with being an independent resource for information" (pg. 29).

The ombudsperson must be a person who has knowledge and experience concerning the provision of family child care. The ombudsperson must be experienced in dealing with governmental entities, interpretation of laws and regulations, investigations, record keeping, report writing, public speaking, and management. A person is not eligible to serve as the ombudsperson while running for or holding public office or while holding a family child care license.