AB 495 California Daycare Compliance

What AB 495 Is

Assembly Bill 495, the Family Preparedness Plan Act, took effect January 1, 2026. It applies to every licensed child care facility in California — including Family Child Care Homes — and establishes specific protocols for protecting children when a parent or guardian becomes suddenly unavailable due to immigration enforcement, military deployment, sudden incarceration, or other domestic crises.

This isn't optional guidance. It's a compliance obligation baked into your licensing requirements, and CCLD may review it as part of licensing oversight.

The Four Core Requirements

1. Immigration Data Restrictions

Licensed providers are prohibited from collecting or documenting the immigration status of any child or family member, unless explicitly mandated by state or federal law. This means:

• Your enrollment forms cannot ask about immigration status unless explicitly mandated by state or federal law
• You cannot request or copy immigration documents (visas, green cards, work permits) as part of intake unless explicitly mandated by state or federal law
• If a parent volunteers immigration information, you are not required to record it and should not include it in the child's file

The restriction protects families from unnecessary collection of sensitive information during enforcement actions.

2. Enforcement Officer Restrictions

Law enforcement and immigration officials are barred from entering nonpublic areas of your child care facility unless they present a valid judicial warrant or a signed judge's order. A warrant is not the same as an ICE administrative warrant (Form I-200) — administrative warrants are issued by immigration officers, not judges, and do not authorize entry into a private residence or child care facility.

If an officer arrives at your door:

• Keep nonpublic areas closed unless the officer presents the required judicial warrant or signed judge's order
• Ask to see a judicial warrant before opening the door to nonpublic areas
• Do not volunteer information about families you serve; follow your privacy procedures
• You are not required to produce child records without a valid judicial warrant or signed judge's order

3. Emergency Contact Exhaustion Protocol

This is the operational centerpiece of AB 495. If a parent is detained, arrested, or becomes suddenly unavailable, you cannot immediately call Child Protective Services (CPS). Instead, you must:

First, attempt to contact every individual listed on the child's emergency card, in the order the parent specified. This includes backup contacts, designated safe adults, extended family members, and any person the parent identified during enrollment.

Second, execute all specific instructions the parent left for this scenario. Some parents will have completed a family preparedness plan with detailed steps — who to call, where the child should go, what attorney to contact.

Third, only after exhausting every contact on the emergency card and following all written instructions — and only if no designated adult can be reached — may you contact CPS.

The logic behind this sequence: CPS involvement in many cases triggers the foster care system, which AB 495 is specifically designed to prevent when a trusted adult is available.

4. Expanded Caregiver Authorization Affidavits

AB 495 broadens who qualifies as a designated caregiver under California's Caregiver's Authorization Affidavit (CAA) framework. Previously, CAAs were largely limited to relatives. Under AB 495, non-relative extended family members — trusted adults with established mentoring or familial relationships — can be designated through a CAA.

This matters operationally because a designated caregiver with a CAA can:

• Authorize school enrollment and school-related medical decisions for the child
• Pick up the child from your facility
• Use those powers without formal court-ordered guardianship

You should encourage families to complete CAAs during enrollment and keep them in the child's file alongside the emergency card.

What to Add to Your Enrollment Process

To comply, update your intake paperwork to include:

A family preparedness plan form — a one-page document where parents can list their designated safe adults, provide specific instructions for crisis scenarios, and identify any caregiver authorization affidavits already on file. The California Attorney General's office has published model safety guidelines, and you must give parents written information on how to access them upon enrollment or re-enrollment.

Revised emergency cards — expand your current emergency contact card to include space for additional contacts specifically designated for family separation scenarios, beyond the standard "who picks up your child" list.

Removal of immigration-related questions — audit your existing enrollment forms and remove any field that asks about immigration status unless state or federal law requires it.

Incident reporting protocol — if an enforcement officer enters your facility or requests child records, you must document the incident and report it to both CDSS and the California Attorney General. Keep a simple incident log template ready.

Inspection and Compliance

CCLD may review AB 495 compliance as part of licensing oversight. They'll check for:

• Written information on accessing the AG model safety guidelines in your parent information packets
• Enrollment forms without fields requesting immigration status unless required by law
• Emergency cards with expanded contact and instruction space
• Evidence that you've distributed the preparedness information to currently enrolled families

Keep these materials current. While AB 495 violations haven't yet generated significant penalty case law (the statute is less than a year old), expect enforcement to tighten as inspection protocols standardize.

The Practical Reality

Most of the AB 495 requirements align with what thoughtful providers already do — maintaining thorough emergency contacts, having backup care plans, and respecting family privacy. The statute formalizes these practices and adds the specific immigration-data prohibition and the CPS-last contact sequence.

If you're still working through the licensing process, build AB 495 compliance into your initial preparation. Our California Home Daycare Licensing Guide covers this alongside every other compliance requirement in the sequence CDSS expects, so you're not retrofitting your paperwork after the fact.

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