Delaware Foster Care Background Check: What's Checked and What Disqualifies You

The background check is often the longest single step in the Delaware foster care licensing process, and it's the one that generates the most anxiety. You might be wondering whether a misdemeanor from your twenties, a DUI from years ago, or your spouse's out-of-state history will end your application before it starts. Here's exactly what DFS checks, what automatically disqualifies you, and what falls into a gray area.

The Four-Part Background Investigation

Every household member aged 18 and older must pass all four checks. There are no exceptions for adult children living at home, elderly parents in your household, or roommates. If someone aged 18 or older sleeps under your roof, they need clearance.

Delaware State Bureau of Investigation (SBI) Criminal History: A fingerprinted search of the Delaware State Police database for all Delaware-based arrests and convictions. You'll be fingerprinted through the IdentoGO digital system — make sure you use the correct DFS-specific service code when scheduling your appointment. Submitting under the wrong category is a common mistake that causes processing delays and may require you to be re-fingerprinted.

FBI National Criminal Check: A fingerprinted federal database search that identifies out-of-state offenses. This catches anything that wouldn't appear in Delaware records alone, including convictions in states where you previously lived, worked, or were arrested while traveling.

Delaware Child Protection Registry: A search of the DFS central registry for "substantiated" reports of child abuse or neglect. This is separate from criminal history and critically important to understand — it includes administrative findings of neglect that may never have resulted in criminal charges. You can have a clean criminal record and still be flagged on this registry.

National Sex Offender Registry: A search of public databases for sexual offenses in any state.

What Automatically Disqualifies You

Delaware statutes (31 Del. C. Section 309) establish "Bar Years" — specific conviction windows that create automatic prohibitions no agency can waive. These are absolute bars, meaning no discretion, no appeals, no exceptions.

Lifetime bars apply to murder, child abuse or neglect convictions, crimes against children (including pornography and exploitation), spousal abuse, rape or sexual assault, kidnapping, and arson. If any household member has one of these convictions at any point in their life, licensing is not possible. This also means that if your 22-year-old child who lives with you has a qualifying conviction, your household cannot be licensed.

10-year bars apply to felony convictions for physical or sexual assault against another adult (not a child or elderly person). If the conviction is more than 10 years old, it moves to the gray-area evaluation described below.

7-year bars cover other non-violent felonies and misdemeanor convictions for crimes against children. These are offenses serious enough to flag but without lifetime consequences.

5-year bars apply to felony drug-related offenses, specifically possession with intent and trafficking.

Additionally, anyone currently listed as "Active" on the Child Protection Registry is barred from fostering until their name is expunged or the case is closed. Substantiated reports — even without criminal prosecution — can prevent licensing.

The Commuter Complication

If you or anyone in your household lived outside Delaware in the past five years, DFS must request a registry check from each state where that person resided. This is where timelines go sideways. Some states respond in two weeks; others take two months or more. Delaware has no control over another state's processing speed, and your application sits in limbo until every response comes back.

This is especially relevant for New Castle County applicants who work in Pennsylvania or New Jersey, or anyone who recently relocated to Delaware. Your employment or prior residency won't disqualify you, but your background check will take significantly longer because DFS needs clearance from those states' registries too. If you lived in a state known for slow processing (and your FHC can often tell you which states those are), plan for a longer timeline from the start.

For Wilmington-area residents, the cross-state complication is the single most common reason licensing takes six to eight months instead of four.

What About Old or Minor Offenses?

A conviction that falls outside the bar windows doesn't automatically disqualify you, but it doesn't automatically clear you either. DFS evaluates the nature of the offense, how long ago it occurred, evidence of rehabilitation, and what your life has looked like since. A shoplifting charge from 15 years ago is very different from a pattern of misdemeanors. A single DUI in your twenties followed by decades of clean living is different from a DUI three years ago.

Be upfront about your history — DFS will find it regardless, and disclosure demonstrates the kind of honesty they're evaluating throughout the licensing process. Trying to hide something that shows up in the check destroys your credibility in a way that the original offense itself might not have.

Traffic violations and minor infractions that didn't result in misdemeanor or felony charges generally aren't an issue. Arrests without convictions may appear on your record but are typically not disqualifying.

Processing Timeline and What You Can Control

Plan for background checks to take 15 to 60 days. Fingerprinting itself is quick — often same-day through IdentoGO. The waiting is for processing at the state and federal level, plus any out-of-state registry requests.

What you can control: get fingerprinted as soon as your FHC authorizes it. Don't wait until your PRIDE training is complete. Make sure every household member schedules their fingerprinting appointment at the same time. One household member dragging their feet on fingerprinting delays the entire application.

For a step-by-step guide to navigating the IdentoGO system with the correct DFS service codes, a background check tracking log for every household member, and guidance on how to address prior offenses in your application narrative, our Delaware Foster Care Licensing Guide walks through every detail.

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