The city’s Health Department failed to inspect 73 pre-K centers in 2017 — despite past problems and 158 complaints, according to an audit by Comptroller Scott Stringer.
The comptroller’s auditors said the agency is supposed to inspect each of the city’s 1,035 pre-K centers at least two times a year.
But in 531 cases, there was just one of the full-scale inspections.
“For the safety and well-being of our children, [the agency’s] own rules require it to comprehensively inspect every child-care center at least twice every year,” said Stringer.
“Skipping inspections at hundreds of child-care centers is unacceptable.”
The audit found red flags across the board when it came to the uninspected centers.
Fifty-three racked up 324 building and safety violations from the Health Department the previous year.
More than half of the violations were deemed either “public health hazards” that required immediate attention or were marked as “critical,” which required repairs within 14 days.
There were also 158 complaints about 49 of the centers, which included abuse allegations, inadequate supervision, facility maintenance issues — and even a report of a lost child.
The Health Department is required to conduct two different inspections each year for pre-K centers: One focuses on the physical conditions of the facilities; the other examines the curriculum implementation, staff clearances and credentials and child supervision.
Acting Health Commissioner Oxiris Barbot — who was appointed to the post permanently on Wednesday — objected to the findings, arguing that agency staffers visited many of the facilities, though not as part of these two required formal inspections.
“[DOH] strongly disagrees with the audit’s conclusions and implications that are based on the auditors’ misinterpretation of the scope of the department’s inspection activities,” she said in a 10-page response.
She also said that “99 percent” of the pre-K programs received “at least one visit” from a Health Department inspector.
But Stringer said his findings were based on the agency’s own regulations.
The mayor’s office dismissed the audit as just plain “wrong.”