Pennsylvania youth camp background check requirements

The organized camps and campgrounds chapter is sanitation only — water, sewage, toilets, garbage. It contains no background check, staff qualification, ratio or training provision. Camp registration itself is a separate $10-a-year registration with the Department of Health under a 1959 statute; registrations run July 1 to June 30 and can be filed and paid online. If you have read the camp rules and concluded Pennsylvania asks nothing of you on screening, you have read the wrong chapter.

• 28 Pa. Code Ch. 19 (Organized Camps and Campgrounds)
• Act 497 of 1959, 35 P.S. §§ 3001–3004 (registration)
• Pa. Department of Health, Organized Camps page (accessed Sept. 2026)

The CPSL definition of a "program, activity or service" expressly includes "a youth camp or program" and "a recreational camp or program." That is the hook that pulls camps in regardless of how they are licensed or registered. The Department of Health told organized camps in a May 13, 2015 letter that it will review CPSL violations and take appropriate action under its own laws and regulations, and that violations “could result in sanctions against an organized camp.”

• 23 Pa.C.S. § 6303 (definitions)
• Pa. Department of Health, CPSL letter to organized camps (May 13, 2015)

Pennsylvania does not have one clearance rule — it has four, and the FBI fingerprint element differs for each: paid staff 18 and over; paid staff aged 14–17; unpaid volunteers 18 and over; and volunteers under 18. Volunteers under 18 need nothing. Paid staff aged 14–17 have their own FBI exemption if they have lived in Pennsylvania for the previous 10 years (or already hold an FBI clearance from after moving here), with an affidavit co-signed by a parent or guardian. Do not apply one rule across your whole roster — that is the most common way camps get this wrong.

• 23 Pa.C.S. §§ 6344, 6344.2

Pennsylvania offers volunteers free clearances. Those are not transferable to employment: an employer is prohibited from accepting a volunteer clearance for a paid position. If a seasonal counselor moves from unpaid to paid — which happens constantly at camps — their clearances must be redone under the paid rules.

• 23 Pa.C.S. §§ 6344(b.3), 6344.2(g)(2)

OCDEL lists several separate exemptions from child care certification for part-day school-age programs (children in kindergarten or older and under 16): one that runs less than 90 consecutive days per calendar year; one that runs 2 hours or less a day on 3 or fewer days a week; a single-purpose program such as basketball instruction or an art class; or a drop-in program where children come and go at will. The 90-day test doesn’t help a certified center or group home that adds school-age children in the summer. A camp serving children below kindergarten age gets none of these exemptions and may need child care certification, which is a substantially heavier regime.

• OCDEL Announcement C-26-01 (10 June 2026)

The volunteer FBI fingerprint fee is $25.95 from 1 October 2026, up from $22.95. If you budget your season in the autumn, budget at the new figure.

An unpaid volunteer may skip the FBI fingerprint check only if they have lived in Pennsylvania for the entire previous 10 years — or have received a DHS FBI clearance since moving here — and swear in writing that they are not disqualified. All clearances are renewed every 60 months, counted from the oldest one. Volunteers who live in another state may serve provisionally for up to 30 days in a calendar year if they meet their home state’s clearance standards.

• 23 Pa.C.S. §§ 6344.2(b.1), (f); 6344.4(3)

An employer other than a child-care institution may let a new paid employee start provisionally for a single period of up to 45 days, but only after they have applied for all clearances and received the child abuse clearance plus either the State Police or FBI result, and only if they never work alone with children and stay in the immediate vicinity of a permanent employee. There is no provisional window for in-state volunteers — their clearances must be in hand before they start.

• 23 Pa.C.S. § 6344(m)