Bright Horizons, one of the largest child care providers in New York City, has agreed not to open new centers this year and will surrender operating permits for a Manhattan location where workers were charged in July with abusing toddlers, including by taping their mouths shut.
The measures are part of a settlement reached last week with the city’s health department, which had taken the rare step of moving to permanently close the Manhattan center, near Columbus Circle, after a series of health and safety violations over the past two years. City officials confirmed the agreement late Tuesday.
“The horrendous abuses that took place under Bright Horizons’s care were nothing short of despicable,” Mayor Zohran Mamdani said in a statement. “In my administration, as we expand universal child care for all New Yorkers, abuses like this will never go unchecked.”
Dr. Alister Martin, the city’s health commissioner, said in a statement that the agreement would strengthen accountability at Bright Horizons. “Creating a safer environment for children must always come first,” he said.
One of the workers at the Manhattan center, Shakia Henley, was accused of spraying children with bleach. On Wednesday, she was sentenced to three years of probation after pleading guilty to one misdemeanor count of child endangerment in State Supreme Court in Manhattan last month. Her lawyer, Eugene Nathanson, declined further comment.
The Columbus Circle center was shut down temporarily last October after employees reported to health officials that a staff member had put a bleach solution in children’s water bottles, which at least one child drank. The move for a permanent closing followed.
Trent Duffy, a Bright Horizons spokesman, said in a statement that the company was “encouraged” by the settlement and “grateful” that the health department “recognized the corrective actions we have taken.”
Those actions, he said, include improving safety protocols, installing a new leader of the company’s New York City operations, bolstering the oversight staff at all centers and enhancing training for employees in “identifying and reporting concerns.”
“We understand that any incident affecting a child is incredibly distressing,” Mr. Duffy said. “And we make it our priority to address every issue carefully and comprehensively.”
The New York Times first brought to light a pattern of problems at Bright Horizons centers in the city based on documents obtained through public records requests last month.
From July 2024 to July 2025, the documents show, the company was the subject of several dozen complaints filed with the health department, including accusations of injuries, inappropriate discipline, workers losing track of children and teachers working in classrooms without having completed the necessary city background checks.
Any family can use Bright Horizons, which has roughly 60 child care programs in New York City, but the company focuses largely on providing regular and backup child care for employees of over 1,000 corporate customers, including The Times. Bright Horizons is also a major provider of publicly funded pre-K and 3-K programs for the city’s Department of Education, which has paid the company more than $100 million in the past five years.
Some of the company’s worst failings were at the Columbus Circle center, where health inspectors substantiated accusations that some workers were mistreating 1- and 2-year-olds by leaving them in soiled diapers; calling them names like “lazy slug” and “retard”; strapping them in chairs; stuffing their mouths with tissue; throwing cups at them; and spraying soapy water in their eyes.
Bright Horizons fired three workers — Ms. Henley, Evelyn Vargas and Latia Townes — in February 2025. Manhattan prosecutors, acting on a health department referral, charged all three with multiple counts of child endangerment and Ms. Vargas with felony counts of assault, strangulation and attempted assault.
An indictment that echoed inspectors’ findings said Ms. Vargas had covered a toddler’s mouth with packing tape so that the girl could not breathe and then made fun of her; force-fed children ginger shots; and, with Ms. Townes, hit children on the head with metal bottles and shoved them to the ground repeatedly.
Ms. Vargas and Ms. Townes, who have pleaded not guilty, were also scheduled to appear in court on Wednesday. Douglas Rankin, a lawyer for Ms. Townes, declined to comment. A lawyer for Ms. Vargas did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
The criminal case cost the Columbus Circle center its contract with the Department of Education. The department has been closely monitoring 20 other Bright Horizons centers’ compliance with their city contracts since January, officials said.
Records suggest Bright Horizons is seeking a role as the city expands free child care. In November, records show, the company hired the Fontas Advisors lobbying firm to help “secure program funding.”
Other terms of the settlement with the city prohibit Bright Horizons from applying to open new child care centers in New York City before Jan. 30, 2027, and require it to detail the causes of past violations and how they have been addressed. The company will also appoint a compliance officer specifically to ensure it is following local health code requirements.
Ed Shanahan is a rewrite reporter and editor covering breaking news and general assignments on the Metro desk.
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