republic-os/legislation/us/states/de/152/sb-216.md

---
type: "Bill"
title: "AN ACT TO AMEND TITLE 16 OF THE DELAWARE CODE RELATING TO LONG TERM CARE FACILITIES AND SERVICES AND CIVIL PENALTIES."
description: "This Act increases the civil penalties for violations of the statutes in Title 16, Chapter 11 related to Long Term Care Facilities and the regulations adopted pursuant to it. For violations that the Department determines pose a serious threat to the health and safety of a resident, the minimum penalty in Section 1109 of Title 16 is increased from $1,000 per violation to $2,000, and the maximum penalty is increased from $10,000 to $20,000 per violation. Each day of a continuing violation constitutes a separate violation. For violations that do not constitute a serious threat to the health and safety of a resident, the maximum penalty is increased from $5,000 to $10,000 per violation. The civil penalties in Section 1109(a)(2) for violations that pose a serious threat to the health and safety of a resident were established in 1998 and have not been increased since then. The maximum civil penalty in Section 1109(c) for violations that do not constitute a serious threat to the health and safety of a resident was set at $10,000 in 1998, but was later reduced to $5,000 in 2000, and has not been increased since then. This Act also repeals the provision which places a cap on the civil penalties for continuing violations."
jurisdiction: "us/states/de"
legislature: "Delaware General Assembly"
session: "152"
identifier: "SB 216"
citation: "Delaware SB 216 (152)"
classification: ["bill"]
subjects: []
status: "enacted"
primary_sponsors: ["Brian Pettyjohn", "Bryan Townsend", "Daniel B. Short", "David L. Wilson", "David P. Sokola", "Eric Morrison", "John \"Jack\" Walsh", "Kendra Johnson", "Michael F. Smith", "Nicole Poore", "Peter C. Schwartzkopf", "Sean Matthews", "Spiros Mantzavinos", "Stell Parker Selby", "William Bush"]
version_count: 2
action_count: 9
vote_count: 2
first_action: "2024-02-26"
last_action: "2024-08-01"
source: "openstates"
source_identifier: "ocd-bill/266188f0-1a4a-49e6-bcc4-7bfbd3d5217d"
source_url: "https://legis.delaware.gov/BillDetail?LegislationId=140928"
source_hash: "3ce74eb8180fe0b6572543e162d033f8f9401e0ed1f583548f9792fa97524ea3"
vintage: "2026-07-01"
source_snapshot: "https://data.openstates.org/daily/2026-07-01/public.pgdump"
retrieved_at: "2026-07-06"
confidence: "reported"
tags: ["legislation", "bill", "us-de"]
---

# Delaware SB 216 (152) — AN ACT TO AMEND TITLE 16 OF THE DELAWARE CODE RELATING TO LONG TERM CARE FACILITIES AND SERVICES AND CIVIL PENALTIES.

This Act increases the civil penalties for violations of the statutes in Title 16, Chapter 11 related to Long Term Care Facilities and the regulations adopted pursuant to it. For violations that the Department determines pose a serious threat to the health and safety of a resident, the minimum penalty in Section 1109 of Title 16 is increased from $1,000 per violation to $2,000, and the maximum penalty is increased from $10,000 to $20,000 per violation. Each day of a continuing violation constitutes a separate violation. For violations that do not constitute a serious threat to the health and safety of a resident, the maximum penalty is increased from $5,000 to $10,000 per violation. The civil penalties in Section 1109(a)(2) for violations that pose a serious threat to the health and safety of a resident were established in 1998 and have not been increased since then. The maximum civil penalty in Section 1109(c) for violations that do not constitute a serious threat to the health and safety of a resident was set at $10,000 in 1998, but was later reduced to $5,000 in 2000, and has not been increased since then. This Act also repeals the provision which places a cap on the civil penalties for continuing violations.

## Version chain

The bill's text revisions, in order — the diff chain from filing to enrollment.

1. **Bill Text** (committee substitute) — [source](https://legis.delaware.gov/json/BillDetail/GenerateHtmlDocument?legislationId=140928&legislationTypeId=1&docTypeId=2&legislationName=SB216)
2. **SA 1 to SB 216** (committee substitute) — [source](http://legis.delaware.gov/json/BillDetail/GeneratePdfDocument?legislationId=141140&legislationTypeId=5&docTypeId=2)

## Votes

- SM — **21–0** (pass) · upper
- SM — **39–0** (pass) · lower

## Sponsors

- Brian Pettyjohn — primary (person)
- Bryan Townsend — primary (person)
- Daniel B. Short — primary (person)
- David L. Wilson — primary (person)
- David P. Sokola — primary (person)
- Eric Morrison — primary (person)
- John "Jack" Walsh — primary (person)
- Kendra Johnson — primary (person)
- Michael F. Smith — primary (person)
- Nicole Poore — primary (person)
- Peter C. Schwartzkopf — primary (person)
- Sean Matthews — primary (person)
- Spiros Mantzavinos — primary (person)
- Stell Parker Selby — primary (person)
- William Bush — primary (person)

## Timeline

The legislative action history — every referral, reading, and vote.

- **2024-02-26** Introduced and Assigned to Health & Social Services Committee in Senate `introduction, referral-committee`
- **2024-03-26** Amendment SA 1 to SB 216 - Introduced and Placed With Bill `amendment-introduction`
- **2024-03-27** Reported Out of Committee (Health & Social Services) in Senate with 1 Favorable, 3 On Its Merits `committee-passage, committee-passage-favorable`
- **2024-04-18** Amendment SA 1 to SB 216 - Passed By Senate. Votes: 21 YES `amendment-passage`
- **2024-04-18** Passed By Senate. Votes: 21 YES `passage`
- **2024-04-23** Assigned to Health & Human Development Committee in House `introduction, referral-committee`
- **2024-05-22** Reported Out of Committee (Health & Human Development) in House with 2 Favorable, 7 On Its Merits `committee-passage, committee-passage-favorable`
- **2024-06-27** Passed By House. Votes: 39 YES 2 ABSENT `passage`
- **2024-08-01** Signed by Governor `executive-signature`

## Source

OpenStates / OpenCivicData bulk snapshot [2026-07-01](https://data.openstates.org/daily/2026-07-01/public.pgdump); origin `ocd-bill/266188f0-1a4a-49e6-bcc4-7bfbd3d5217d`. Confidence: reported (aggregated from official Delaware legislature records).