1. A. The local department shall provide resource parents with developmentally appropriate and trauma-informed resources to manage the behaviors of children in care, including behavior management methods, and connect the resource parent with community programs to address concerning behaviors.
2. B. Resource parents shall establish clear expectations for behavior and understand and manage challenging behaviors in a trauma-informed manner, rewarding good behavior.
3. C. Only a resource parent or other adult caregiver approved by the local department and known to the child in care may discipline a child in care.
4. D. Resource parents may only physically restrain a child in care to protect the child in care from self-injury or from injuring others.

5. E. Prohibited punishments include:

   1. (1) Using corporal punishment that includes spanking, shaking, physical hitting, or any other type of physical punishment, no matter how inflicted;
   2. (2) Requiring physical exercises such as running laps or performing pushups;
   3. (3) Forcing a child in care to assume or hold an uncomfortable position such as squatting or bending, or to repeat physical movements;
   4. (4) Confining a child in care in a locked room;
   5. (5) Using mechanical or chemical restraints;
   6. (6) Denying essential program services, such as not taking a child in care to a planned appointment for educational, psychiatric, or psychological services;
   7. (7) Withholding visitation or communication with the child in care’s family or kin;
   8. (8) Withholding meals, clothing, or bedding, or disrupting a child in care’s sleep;
   9. (9) Making remarks that belittle or ridicule a child in care or a child in care's family; and
   10. (10) Threatening to have a child in care removed from the resource home.

Authority: Human Services Article, §2-209, Annotated Code of Maryland

Effective date: July 4, 1994 (21:13 Md. R. 1155)

Chapter revised effective December 12, 2002 (29:24 Md. R. 1918)

Regulation .02B amended effective June 15, 2009 (36:12 Md. R. 836)

Regulation .08A amended effective June 15, 2009 (36:12 Md. R. 836)

Chapter revised effective April 16, 2012 (39:7 Md. R. 490)

Regulation .04E amended effective September 30, 2013 (40:19 Md. R. 1543)

Regulations .01—.24 repealed and new Regulations .01 — .20 adopted effective December 12, 2024 (51:24 Md. R. 1081)