Bottom Line for Florida Nonprofits
- ✓Child care personnel, including volunteers — except intermittent volunteers under 10 hours a month who are always in a screened person's line of sight (§ 402.302(3))
- ✓Summer day camp and summer 24-hour camp volunteers, with the same exception (§ 409.175(2)(j))
- ✓Volunteer athletic coaches, managers and referees under independent sanctioning authorities, from July 1, 2026 (§ 943.0438)
- +3 more required roles below
State Laws That Apply to Volunteer Background Checks
Florida Statute § 435.04 — Level 2 Background Screening Standards
Fla. Stat. § 435.04Defines Level 2 screening: fingerprinting for statewide criminal history through FDLE, national criminal history through the FBI, local criminal records checks, and a search of the sexual predator and sexual offender registries of any state the person lived in during the preceding five years. Other statutes decide which roles must pass it.
Florida Statute § 943.0438 — Youth Athletic Coaches
Fla. Stat. § 943.0438Requires independent sanctioning authorities to screen athletic coaches — coaches, assistant coaches, managers and referees, paid or volunteer, with direct contact with minors — using Level 2 screening effective July 1, 2026 (a date moved by chs. 2024-243 and 2025-97). The authority may not delegate screening to individual teams and must keep records for five years; teams affiliated with private schools fall outside the definition.
Florida Statute § 943.0542 — VECHS (National Child Protection Act program)
Fla. Stat. § 943.0542Lets qualified entities — including nonprofits that provide care, treatment, education, training, instruction, supervision or recreation to children, the elderly or people with disabilities — obtain state and national fingerprint-based criminal history on employees and volunteers. Participation is voluntary; from July 1, 2026, entities may screen through AHCA's Care Provider Background Screening Clearinghouse instead.
Florida Statute § 435.12(3)(c) — School Volunteers
Fla. Stat. § 435.12(3)(c); § 1012.465School volunteers may be screened at the discretion of the school, through the Clearinghouse or VECHS (added by ch. 2025-56). The mandatory school screening statute, § 1012.465, covers noninstructional employees, contractors and volunteer school chaplains — not volunteers generally.
Who Must Be Screened in Florida
!Legally Required to Be Screened
- •Child care personnel, including volunteers — except intermittent volunteers under 10 hours a month who are always in a screened person's line of sight (§ 402.302(3))
- •Summer day camp and summer 24-hour camp volunteers, with the same exception (§ 409.175(2)(j))
- •Volunteer athletic coaches, managers and referees under independent sanctioning authorities, from July 1, 2026 (§ 943.0438)
- •Department of Juvenile Justice program volunteers (§ 985.644)
- •Agency for Persons with Disabilities provider volunteers (§ 393.0655) and elder-services direct service volunteers, with a 20-hours-a-month exception (§ 430.0402)
- •Guardian ad litem volunteers (§ 39.821)
Types of Background Checks Required in Florida
How to Get Background Checks in Florida
$5 per check — a national criminal database search, sex offender registries in all 50 states and an SSN trace, with human FCRA review when a record needs it. It never replaces a check Florida law requires.
Start Free Today →Volunteer Screening in Florida: What You Need to Know
Florida is the only state that writes "Level 1" and "Level 2" screening into statute — FDLE notes the terms aren't used by the FBI or other states. The same volunteer carve-out (under 10 hours a month and always in a screened person's line of sight) recurs across child care, camps, juvenile justice and disability services. Florida licenses no summer camps yet requires Level 2 screening for camp volunteers, and child care that is an integral part of an accredited church or parochial school is exempt from licensing but never from screening (§ 402.316(1)). When Florida law requires a criminal history check, the Florida record must come from FDLE (§ 943.053(12)), so a commercial check cannot satisfy a statutory Level 1 or Level 2 requirement.
Compliance Tips for Florida Nonprofits
- 1
For roles no statute already covers (VECHS can't replace required screening such as child care or summer camps), nonprofits serving children, the elderly or people with disabilities can enroll in FDLE's VECHS program: a volunteer check costs $28 ($18 state + $10 FBI) plus the LiveScan vendor's fee, and FDLE usually returns state and national results together within three business days.
- 2
From July 1, 2026, you can screen through AHCA's Clearinghouse instead ($60 including five-year fingerprint retention) — but the state then makes the eligibility decision and you see only the Florida public record, not the national record.
- 3
Youth sports: the independent sanctioning authority must run the Level 2 screening itself — the law says it may not delegate that to individual teams — and keep records for five years.
- 4
Don't let a volunteer in a covered role have contact with children or vulnerable adults until screening is complete (§ 435.06(2)(a)); child care allows a limited 45-day provisional status under direct supervision.
- 5
Where Florida law mandates Level 1 or Level 2, run that process. A national check can add identity verification and all-50-state registry coverage, but it does not satisfy the statutory requirement.
- 6
Search Florida's sexual offender and predator registry (free, FDLE) as an immediate first step.
Frequently Asked Questions
Does Florida require background checks for my nonprofit’s volunteers?
Only for volunteers in specific roles or settings; no Florida rule covers every nonprofit. Florida has no blanket volunteer screening mandate, but its statutes route specific volunteer roles into a two-tier system written into law: Level 1 (employment history, a name-based FDLE check and the national sex-offender website) and Level 2 (FDLE and FBI fingerprints plus the sex-offender registries of every state lived in during the prior five years).
How long does a Florida volunteer background check take?
Official state checks: about three business days for FDLE VECHS results (state and national together), or typically 5–7 business days through the AHCA Clearinghouse. VolunteerBadge's national criminal search returns most results in minutes; a record that needs human FCRA review can take up to about 72 hours.