Kansas daycare with history of complaints and violations is shut down by state
A daycare in Winfield, Kansas with at least eight complaints since February 2019 has been shut down, the Kansas Department of Health and Environment said Thursday.
Fairytale Friends Daycare, operated by Rose Trobaugh, responded in a Facebook message that they notified the state of their closure two weeks ago following a longtime battle with a state inspector.
“She knew my mother in law who came to visit, and my visits were awful after that,” Fairytale Friends Daycare said in a message. “They got me on things that had always been fine ... I constantly fixed everything they told me to but they said they would always find more and that I would not win.”
Fairytale Friends Daycare, presumably Trobaugh, said they reported it to “their boss and nothing was done.”
A KDHE emergency suspension order says a complaint was made July 20 about Trobaugh being involved in “inappropriate conduct while caring for children.”
Trobaugh was not there during a July 26 on-site investigation, the order says.
“Three adults residing in the home were caring for children,” the order says. “None of the adults had been submitted for background checks required to determine compliance . . . The home was unclean and not well-maintained. Trash and hazards were accessible to children. Children were in an upstairs bedroom that had not been approved for fire safety. There were also hazards in the outdoor play area.”
The KDHE offers a portal where child care compliance records and complaint investigations can be found at bit.ly/3j3QdYo.
The site shows eight complaints between February 2019 and July 2020, and does not include any this year. Those complaints are wide-ranging, but include prescription medication not being locked away; aerosol cans sitting at the front door in reach of children; unsupervised children in rooms with the door closed; sanitation issues; 13 children for one caretaker; and a construction table with hand sander and extension cord in the outside play area.
Compliance records and annual checkups of the daycare going back to June 2019 have also found issues. After problems were reported in two of the first four surveys, Trobaugh submitted a corrective action plan.
“I have definitely learned from this experience,” she wrote. “I do not want to continue with the negative reports so I will do every thing I can to maintain a safe and clean daycare and home.”
The two surveys since then have found 15 violations, including kitchen trash overflowing the lid; dog feces on the bathroom floor; dirty laundry on top of diaper changing pad; missing medical records for children; a missing background check of a worker; and a 16-month-old eating a crayon.
The daycare is at a home on the west side of Winfield. It was built in 1900 and is valued at about $21,000, according to Cowley County records.
The emergency suspension order can be appealed.
This story was originally published July 29, 2021 at 4:58 PM.