Hennepin County
Hennepin County Health and Human Services, Child Care Licensing
In short
Hennepin County Health and Human Services, Child Care Licensing issues 2 permits we publish for Hennepin County, last verified 2026-09-28. Each carries the fee as the agency publishes it, with a link to the schedule it was read from.
What this agency issues
| Permit | Issuing agency | Fee | Renews | Last checked |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Family Child Care / Group Family Child Care Home License | Hennepin County Health and Human Services, Child Care Licensing | $50 a year — the statutory maximum a county may charge for a family child care license (Minn. Stat. §142B.12, subd. 2); Hennepin County's own family child care licensing page does not itemize a dollar figure of its own separate from this statutory cap | continuous license on a calendar-year cycle (January 1 to December 31), auto-renewing each year once the license fee is invoiced and paid; Minnesota eliminated the former 1-year/2-year license choice for family child care statewide effective January 1, 2025 | 2026-09-28 |
| Child Care Center License — Minnesota DCYF (Hennepin County)only if it applies to you | Hennepin County Health and Human Services, Child Care Licensing | No fee | not applicable at the county level | 2026-09-28 |
Fees shown as a range or formula are set that way by the issuing agency — we do not average them into a single number.
About each permit
Family Child Care / Group Family Child Care Home License
This is the one Hennepin County license that genuinely reaches inside Minneapolis with no city carve-out, because it is a human services licensing function, not the environmental-health function that drives the food/pool/body-art exclusion maps. Hennepin County Health and Human Services handles intake, the required orientation, inspection and the licensing recommendation for a family child care home or group family child care home — in-home care for children from more than one family, in the provider's own residence, up to about 14 children for group family child care — anywhere in the county, city or not. The state issues the license itself based on the county's recommendation. The fee cap is $50 a year under Minn. Stat. §142B.12, subd. 2, which still literally carries a legacy '$100 for a two-year license' clause, but two-year licenses are no longer issued now that every license runs on the continuous annual calendar-year cycle Minnesota adopted effective January 1, 2025, so $50/year is the operative figure. Fees were waived statewide for all of 2025, with counties resuming fee collection for new licenses on July 1, 2025. A licensed child care center that also serves food needs a separate food establishment license (see Part B) in a county-jurisdiction city; the Food Protection Ordinance's Low Limited fee tier explicitly names 'half-day childcare with snacks and milk only' as an example.
Child Care Center License — Minnesota DCYF (Hennepin County)
No fee applies at the county level. A child care CENTER — a facility in a location other than the provider's own residence — is licensed directly by the state, not by Hennepin County. Hennepin County's own family child care page draws this line itself, directing complaints about a licensed child care center to the state Department of Human Services rather than to the county. This is the opposite scope from the family child care HOME license listed separately for this jurisdiction: Hennepin County licenses homes (including group family child care homes) countywide, while DCYF's own child care center application page shows centers licensed by the state under Minn. Rules Ch. 9503. A commercial daycare center should look to the state license, not to Hennepin County, for its core operating license.
Contact
- Jurisdiction
- Hennepin County
- Phone
- 612-348-3883
Contact details are taken from the agency’s own site or its published fee schedule. Where we have not verified a phone number we leave it blank rather than guess.
Sources
Every fee and term above was read from one of these government pages on the date shown.
- Apply for a child care center license (state-issued, no county role)Minnesota Department of Children, Youth, and Families · primary source · retrieved 2026-09-29
- Family child care license — states Hennepin County licenses family child care HOMES, and distinguishes child care centers as a state (DCYF) functionHennepin County · primary source · retrieved 2026-09-29
- Family child care licensing (county-delegated system overview)Minnesota Department of Children, Youth, and Families · primary source · retrieved 2026-09-29
- Minn. Stat. Ch. 245A, Human Services Licensing Act (county-delegated licensing mechanism: intake, orientation, inspection, recommendation)Minnesota Office of the Revisor of Statutes · primary source · retrieved 2026-09-29
- Minnesota Statutes section 142B.12 — child care license fees by capacity, and the absence of a fee for family child careMinnesota Office of the Revisor of Statutes · primary source · retrieved 2026-09-03
Other offices serving Hennepin County
The full permit list for this jurisdiction
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Minnesota jurisdictions
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