CARVER COUNTY, Minn — As a new parent, you don't realize how hard it is to find childcare.
First, you have to find someone close to where you live who can work with your family's schedule. Most importantly, you want to make sure they can take care of your most prized possession... your child.
Recently, viewer Jackie Schulze reached out to KARE 11's Alicia Lewis on Instagram with a message saying she hired a woman to do childcare and paid her. Unfortunately, it was too good to be true and this mom was not alone.
Schulze, of Waconia, said that she started looking for childcare before her twins were even born.
"Some I never heard back from, some were like we'll put you on our waiting list and others don't have the capacity and won't for a long time," Schulze said.
With her due date approaching fast and no luck in her search, Schulze gave the Carver County Daycare & Childcare Facebook group a try.
"I put out a call like, 'Hey I'm in Waconia looking for care for my kids," Schulze said.
She got a message from a woman named Natalie Bloss.
"Natalie reached out and said, 'Hey, I'm a stay-at-home mom, I can legally care for one family. I just got done caring for twins, let's set up an interview,'" Schulze said.
When Bloss mentioned that she just watched twins, Schulze thought it was a match made in heaven. After she and her husband chatted with Bloss more, she seemed trustworthy.
"She quoted a lot of state law and regulations," Schulze said. "She talked about meal plan that she would use, she kind of showed me the classroom where they would do curriculum items, so I just thought she really knew what she was talking about."
After touring Bloss' home and contacting her references, Schulze and her husband signed the contract and handed over a check for $2,800 bucks to save their spot. Once Schulze's twins were born, she said Bloss became more evasive.
"Ultimately, the start date got pushed back once, the second time she had COVID and was in the hospital with a multitude of issues," Schulze said. "That's when I said, 'This is not going to work, I'm going to need to find alternate care.'"
In their text chain, Schulze canceled with Bloss citing an "extreme lack of communication." Bloss replied she would get her "refund within 30 days," but that didn't happen.
"We realized right away we had been scammed," Schulze said.
Schulze wasn't alone. Carver County court records show Bloss failed to refund money to 14 families in 4 different counties across the Twin Cities metro allegedly using similar tactic.
Find a family, build trust and take their money.
"I felt the urgency to secure my spot because she said so many other people were meeting with her," said Amy Colaw of Eagan who also fell victim and she wasn't alone either.
"I typically like to think that I'm a pretty good judge of character and she completely fooled me," said Allie Makozak of New Hope. Both Makozak and Colaw paid Bloss $1,600 bucks to save their spot for childcare.
"Then it was radio silence," Amy said.
Bloss had a pattern with the families. According to court documents, she would cite excuses like a broken foot, COVID, or an alleged "death in the family" all to push the start date of the care or delay giving families back their deposit.
Eventually, parents found out about each other's stories via Facebook.
"Literally within 24 hours, there were 11 people in a Facebook messenger group sharing our stories," Makozak said.
After multiple families filed police reports against Bloss, Carver County picked up the investigation, later charging her with Theft-by Swindle.
Beyond the money, the new parents also suffered stolen time.
"I never got like the full like maternity leave experience because it just felt so chaotic with everything that was going on on top of being a new mom and having hormones," Schulze said. "I really felt like that experience was kind of robbed from me which makes me really angry."
Bloss was convicted in May with two felony counts of Theft-by Swindle. She received five years of probation and had to pay restitution to the victims. KARE 11 made many attempts to reach out to Bloss by phone and at her last known address and have not heard back.
How can parents find legitimate child care? Karen Bratland helps people in the process of starting childcare services in Minnesota through Child Care Wayfinder.
She said parents shouldn't have to play detective in terms of finding legitimate care.
"One step that a lot of parents don't know exists is that [the Minnesota Department of Human Services] has what's known as licensing look up," Bratland said. "You can connect through it through parentaware.org or you can also go to the DHS website and you can actually verify if those providers that you're speaking with are actually licensed. You can look them up by name, city or county."
Besides looking up their licensing, Bratland added that you should tour in-home daycares and call references. She said that in the state of Minnesota, you don't need to be licensed to watch just one singular family, but you do need a license if you watch more than one family's kids.