{"id":196787,"date":"2026-04-14T13:37:10","date_gmt":"2026-04-14T13:37:10","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/196787\/"},"modified":"2026-04-14T13:37:10","modified_gmt":"2026-04-14T13:37:10","slug":"violations-found-in-herricks-partnered-harbor-child-care","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/196787\/","title":{"rendered":"Violations found in Herricks-partnered Harbor Child Care"},"content":{"rendered":"

Violations were cited in five complaints filed with the New York Office of Children and Family Services at the Herricks-partnered Harbor Child Care<\/a> location since the start of this school year.\u00a0<\/p>\n

All the violations have been corrected, according to the office website and Harbor Child Care.<\/p>\n

\u201cChildren cannot be left without competent supervision at any time,\u201d one violation from Nov. 18, 2025, said on the Office of Children and Family website<\/a>. The violation also referred to the regulation requiring immediate notification to parents of any events mentioned while the child is at daycare. All childcare centers can be searched through the office website.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u201cWe do everything in our power to ensure that our families, our children and our team members are all safe and sound,\u201d Florence Prophete-Barbour, Harbor\u2019s executive director, said. \u201cWe comply with the letter of the law.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n

She said violations like these are common in early childhood programs.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u201cLook up any early childhood programs, and you would find violations across Long Island,\u201d she said. \u201cPlease understand that violations occur across all daycare programs, not just Harbor, not just Herricks.\u201d<\/p>\n

According to the Office of Children and Family Services, none of the other centers in the Herricks section listed any violations within this school year. Office data shows that 18 of the 39 daycare centers in the surrounding districts of New Hyde Park, Manhasset, Great Neck and Mineola have had violations this school year.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u201cThe safety and well-being of all children served by New York State\u2019s child care providers is the Office of Children and Family Services\u2019 highest priority,\u201d Daniel Marans, assistant director of the New York office\u2019s public information office, said. \u201cOCFS substantiated a complaint related to adequate supervision at Harbor Child Care and worked with the facility to resolve the violation.\u201d<\/p>\n

Prophete-Barbour said the Harbor is not overseen by Herricks, but it uses the district\u2019s facility at 999 Herricks Road. She declined to provide the number of students enrolled in the daycare from the school district, citing privacy concerns.\u00a0<\/p>\n

There are 439 children enrolled in Harbor Day Care Center, according to the Office of Children and Family Services.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Tony Sinanis, superintendent of Herricks Public Schools, who partners with Harbor Child Care for Universal Pre-Kindergarten<\/a>, declined to provide comment on behalf of the district.\u00a0<\/p>\n

At the district\u2019s March 18 school board meeting, a parent approached trustees with concerns about the Harbor Day Care.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe\u2019ve seen safety concerns around kids being left alone,\u201d she said. \u201cA lot of the parents have been talking about it. We\u2019re just seeing if this has been addressed at all.\u201d<\/p>\n

She said she is concerned about new management and budget restrictions that are leading to understaffing amid high faculty turnover.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Prophete-Barbour said the current management has been present for \u201cquite some time\u201d and that staff turnover has not been any higher than the average rate for early childhood care programs. She said she was not aware of any budget difficulties in replacing staff.\u00a0<\/p>\n

She said turnover at Harbor is par for the course as compared to other educational institutions. The parent told the school board that her daughter\u2019s classroom has a rotating teacher.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Prophete-Barbour said teachers are hired for Harbor and that in order to meet everyone\u2019s needs they are supporting all classrooms.\u00a0<\/p>\n

The executive director said Harbor continues to do whatever it can to ensure safety for all and adherence to the law.\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Violations were cited in five complaints filed with the New York Office of Children and Family Services at…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":196788,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[37],"tags":[78405,65409,9,24,63,66389,122,124,123,44720],"class_list":{"0":"post-196787","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-queens","8":"tag-harbor-child-care","9":"tag-herricks","10":"tag-new-york","11":"tag-new-york-city","12":"tag-nyc","13":"tag-office-of-children-and-family-services","14":"tag-queens","15":"tag-queens-headlines","16":"tag-queens-news","17":"tag-violations"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/196787","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=196787"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/196787\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/196788"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=196787"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=196787"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=196787"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}