HARRISBURG, Nov. 28 – Applicants for certain clearances who register under Identogo for fingerprints and are cleared to work with children in Pennsylvania can now receive their results electronically via email, according to state Reps. Pam DeLissio, D-Montgomery/Phila, and Brett Miller, R-Lancaster.
The lawmakers called the move a huge assist; to both applicants and employers who recruit staff.
Earlier this year, Miller’s H.B. 764–was signed into law as Act 12 of 2022. This act allows certain employers to provisionally hire an individual for up to 45 days before all required child care clearances are obtained. The goal of this bill was to address the delay that child care employees were experiencing in receiving their clearances via the U.S. Mail, which often took weeks. This prevented the timely hiring of employees in many instances.
“While the improvements of House Bill 764 were good, I began looking at ways to further increase protections for children. One way to accomplish this was by further reducing the time it took for a prospective employee to receive their FBI clearances,” DeLissio said. “The solution was to have clearances issued electronically.”
To solve this, DeLissio and Miller worked together over 18 months with the departments of General Services and Human Services, as well as the Pennsylvania State Police, who in turn needed to coordinate with the FBI.
The result is that now, FBI background checks can be applied for online, and an electronic result received. The shortened time to receive results due to electronic delivery will further safeguard children, aid applicants in obtaining positions of employment and aid employers in filling vacancies of positions that serve children.
The lawmakers noted that if any background check has a record associated with it, those results will not be electronically available and can only be transmitted by U.S. Mail, which takes at least 7-10 business days. In addition to any email notification, all applicants will still receive results transmitted by U.S. Mail. Full details are available by
https://www.dhs.pa.gov/KeepKidsSafe/Clearances/Pages/default.aspx
“The enormous amount of work we put into this was well worth it because we know that many people all across Pennsylvania will benefit. We encourage the General Assembly to continue building on our efforts and expand this electronic notification system to all sectors that require its employees to have background clearances,” Miller said.
