Reply to Pay teen to stay with younger sibling?

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[quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous]Both kids are old enough to be on their own.  I wouldn't put one of mine in charge of the other, but that's the dynamics of my family.  Each kid is in charge of himself when they are home alone and each is accountable to me for their own behavior and to tell me if a problem is occurring at the house, which could mean tattling on the other.

I have paid my oldest to take care of my youngest, but usually he does it for free.  The reason is that so often he does things that waste my time or cost me money (just typical life things, nothing major, except when he lost a $500 retainer, but preventable).  As I've told him, he owes me that time and can work it off through babysitting.  On occasion I've offered to pay and he's declined because he wants to do something nice for me and that's something that's easy for him to do and makes me happy.  [/quote]

Unfortunately, at 9, it looks like Montgomery County guidelines might not allow the youngest child to be home alone for the entire duration of an early release day. The guidelines for 8-12 state "short periods, such as before and after school, but not for an entire day." This could go either way. Technically they were at school that day, so this does qualify as "after school". However, it is a longer period of time than a typical school day and might thus be considered closer to an entire day and therefore too long. I could well be misinterpreting the guidelines, but it appears at least possible that the older child DOES need to officially be "in charge" as the babysitter. I still wouldn't pay in this scenario though.
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I think you are misinterpreting the guidelines.  Truly, I am not worried about CPS coming to my house and taking my kids away because I've left them "alone" with each other for a few hours.  [/quote]

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