§ 20-678 — Prospective employees required to submit to comprehensive background check. Restrictions on offers of employment or contracts. Written statements re prior criminal convictions or disciplinary action. Federal form required. Maintenance and inspection of records.

(a) Each homemaker-companion agency, prior to extending an offer of employment or entering into a contract with a prospective employee who may provide companion services or homemaker services, shall require such prospective employee to submit to a comprehensive background check. No homemaker-companion agency shall extend an offer of employment or enter into a contract with a prospective employee (1) whose name appears on the list of excluded individuals or entities posted in the federal online database maintained by the United States Department of Health and Human Services Office of Inspector General for a conviction that has occurred during the preceding five years, or (2) who, during the preceding five years, has been: (A) Convicted or released from incarceration for a criminal offense related to the delivery of an item or service under any state health care program, as defined in 42 USC 1320a-7(h); (B) under federal or state law, convicted or released from incarceration for a criminal offense relating to neglect or abuse of patients in connection with the delivery of a health care item or service; (C) convicted or released from incarceration for a felony relating to fraud, theft, embezzlement, breach of fiduciary responsibility or other financial misconduct, in connection with the delivery of a health care item or service or with respect to any act or omission in a health care program operated by or financed, in whole or in part, by any federal, state or local government agency; (D) under federal or state law, convicted or released from incarceration for a felony relating to the unlawful manufacture, distribution, prescription or dispensing of a controlled substance; or (E) subject to a substantiated finding of neglect, abuse, physical harm or misappropriation of property, the value of which exceeds two thousand dollars, by the administrative proceeding of a state or federal agency. (b) Each homemaker-companion agency shall require that a prospective employee complete and sign a form which contains questions as to whether the prospective employee was convicted of a crime involving violence or dishonesty in a state court or federal court in any state; or was subject to any decision imposing disciplinary action by a licensing agency in any state, the District of Columbia, a United States possession or territory or a foreign jurisdiction. Any prospective employee who makes a false written statement regarding such prior criminal convictions or disciplinary action shall be guilty of a class A misdemeanor. (c) Each homemaker-companion agency shall require any employee, after accepting an offer of employment or execution of a contract with such agency to perform services for such agency, to submit a completed and verified United States Citizenship and Immigration Services Form I-9 to the homemaker-companion agency. (d) Each homemaker-companion agency shall maintain a paper or electronic copy of any materials obtained during the comprehensive background check and shall make such records available for inspection upon request of the Department of Consumer Protection. Each homemaker-companion agency shall notify, in writing, all individuals receiving services of the agency's comprehensive background check policy and cite to the provisions of this section.

Legislative History

(P.A. 06-187, S. 60; P.A. 11-242, S. 94; P.A. 13-88, S. 1; P.A. 21-37, S. 21.) History: P.A. 11-242 added provisions requiring prospective employees to submit to a comprehensive background check and sign a form re past criminal convictions and disciplinary action by licensing agencies, deleted provisions re employees hired on or after October 1, 2006, and added provision requiring homemaker-companion agencies to maintain background check records and make such records available for inspection by Department of Consumer Protection, effective January 1, 2012; P.A. 13-88 made no changes, effective January 1, 2014; P.A. 21-37 designated existing provisions as Subsecs. (a), (b) and (d), amended Subsec. (a) to make technical changes and add Subdivs. (1) and (2) re prohibition on offer of employment or contracts with certain prospective employees, amended Subsec. (b) to make technical changes, added Subsec. (c) re requirement to submit federal form and amended Subsec. (d) to add provision requiring agency to notify individuals receiving services of policy, effective January 1, 2022.