In the images released by family members, both boys have large visible blisters on their shoulders and backs. Courtesy.
A Vinita daycare that allegedly allowed two young boys to be severely sunburned has been cited 19 times by the Department of Human Services in the last 10 months, records show.
The two boys, ages 5 and 7, are both light skinned, according to their aunt, who circulated the graphic pictures on Facebook over the weekend. They were apparently taken to a splash pad on Friday and left outside with no sunscreen.
In the images, both boys have large yellow blisters on their shoulders and backs that their aunt said were treated at the Hillcrest Hospital burn unit in Tulsa. She later said the boys had been flown to a Shriner’s Hospital in Texas.
The Vinita daycare, Happiness is a Learning Center, has a number of citations stretching back to last Sept. 30. No record exists before that date, and phone calls to the center on Monday were not returned.
Vinita police said only that a report had been filed with the department over the weekend, and a spokesman there said police chief Bobby Floyd was out Monday morning “investigating that case himself.”
Debra Martin, Communications Manager for DHS, said Monday afternoon an investigation into the facility had been launched as a result of the Facebook post.
The “noncompliances” observed by DHS workers at the daycare center since last year range from things like “not having a no-smoking sign posted,” to multiple instances of “not having a master teacher on staff” and no one on staff having “bronze credentials for director.”
Those two noncompliances were observed during the last DHS visit to the facility on May 29, according to DHS records.
It was the second time that month a complaint was lodged for not having a master teacher, and the third time since January the facility had been cited for not having anyone staff with director’s credentials. In the observation log, a DHS worker noted that no one with director’s credentials has been at the facility since Dec. 23, 2014, and that a plan of correction that was due in March had expired without any action.
According to DHS records, the daycare center has been observed four times since Sept. 30. The most citations lodged in a single visit came May 19, when 13 noncompliances were observed.
Happiness is a Learning Center was cited for having 17 children and only two directors in a space appropriate for only nine children, records show. Another citation was for having an employee tell children that another child crying during story time should be ignored “because he is being ugly.”
Reaction to the boys’ pictures on social media has been swift. The aunt’s original post has been shared nearly 1,500 times, and Facebook and Google+ accounts in the daycare’s name have been swarmed with negative reviews.
