OCYF Updated Certificate of Compliance Guidance
The Office of Children Youth & Families (OCYF) has provided an update regarding providers’ renewal application(s) for a Certificate of Compliance. Licensing Administration continues to work diligently to process the renewal applications as quickly as possible. However, given OCYF’s limitations in working remotely and a temporary reduction in staff, they cannot meet past commitments to issue a renewal Certificate of Compliance within 5 days of receipt of application. Until staffing is restored, the new goal is to have agencies’ renewed Certificate of Compliance emailed to the provider prior to the expiration date of your current Certificate of Compliance.
To minimize phone calls and emails concerning the anticipated date of the renewal issuance, as the provider Certificate of Compliance is completed, it will email it to you. OCYF is currently processing March expiration dates and have not finished them yet. Please wait until April to inquire about a March expiration date.
Beginning in April, you should inquire about your certificate’s status only if your Non-Provisional Certificate of Compliance has expired or will expire within a week, and you did not receive the renewed Certificate of Compliance in your email. Be sure to check your Spam/Junk folder as some OCYF emails have been found in them. A Non-Provisional Certificate of Compliance is a Certificate number that ends with a zero (i.e., 123450).
OCYF acknowledges there is a deadline to return the renewal application found on the renewal application packet coversheet, HS1230. However, given the mail delays during the pandemic and the backlog in issuing the renewal licenses, that deadline is not crucial. Provided OCYF has the application prior to the expiration date of your agencies’ Certificate of Compliance, OCYF can process it before it expires. It is not necessary to call or email to request an extension or notify OCYF that it will be late.
The Bureau of Equal Opportunity has requested that during the pandemic, the Civil Rights Compliance Questionnaires be emailed to their offices as staff are working remotely. Again, there is no need to call or email to request an extension or notify them that the Questionnaire will be late. The email addresses are:
- Central/Northern/Southeast Regions – RA-PWBEOCRCQCENTRAL@pa.gov
- Western Region – RA-PWBEOCRCQWESTERN@pa.gov
A Provisional Certificate of Compliance (ending in a 1, 2, 3, or 4) is never automatically renewed with receipt of the renewal application. The region determines when the Certificate is ready to be renewed. If you have further questions, please contact RCPA Children’s Policy Director Jim Sharp.
