Auditors Find Risks at Child-Care Centers : Safety: Inspections in several states find gamut of hazards despite licensing of facilities. Two lawmakers blame cuts in monitoring staffs.

Some children in day-care centers and foster homes are exposed to raw sewage, scalding water, household chemicals, insect infestations and littered playgrounds, federal auditors say.

Auditors for the inspector general’s office of the Department of Health and Human Services say some preschool children may also be spending their days with child-care workers who have criminal backgrounds.

The findings were based on inspections of 149 licensed day-care, foster care and Head Start programs in Nevada, Wisconsin, North Carolina, South Carolina, Delaware and Virginia.

Combined, those child-care providers were serving more than 6,600 children.

The auditors also looked at 106 Native American Head Start programs in Alaska, Arizona, California, Idaho, Nevada, Oregon and Washington.

The purpose of the reviews, which continue in Missouri, is to determine whether child-care providers that receive federal money comply with federal, state and local health and safety standards, and to assess state oversight of day-care facilities.

An official of the inspector general’s office said the agency is not ready to draw any conclusions about the quality of child-care nationwide, but Sen. Christopher J. Dodd (D-Conn.) and Rep. Ron Wyden (D-Ore.) said they see a problem.

“The pattern of health and safety violations across states is disturbing,” said Dodd, the chairman of a Senate subcommittee on children and families. “Pinched budgets have forced many states to cut back on staff for monitoring programs.”

Dodd and Wyden, the chairman of the House Small Business subcommittee on regulation, are investigating the quality of child care.

“I am convinced that significant numbers of kids under the age of 5 may be in day-care facilities that are unsanitary, unsafe and possibly dangerous,” Wyden said.

Wyden also said he is convinced that the Clinton Administration’s plans to reform the welfare system and require more single mothers to work “cannot succeed unless adequate and safe day care is available.”

An official of the inspector general’s office, speaking on condition of anonymity, said the majority of child-care providers surveyed had health or safety hazards.

“You’ve got kids having access to chemicals under the sinks, kids playing in play areas that are not fenced in or with debris, sewage in others . . . fire extinguishers that are not being filled properly,” the official said. “Children naturally are at risk in those facilities.”