A shocking state audit released today revealed 119 cases where addresses for registered sex offenders matched those of child care providers licensed by the beleaguered state Department of Early Education and Care.

“No parent who drops their child off at day care should have to worry about the safety of their son or daughter,” state Auditor Suzanne M. Bump said in a statement. “The presence of registered sex offenders in such proximity to groups of children is information parents, providers, and the EEC must have and act upon.”

In mid-audit, Bump said she took her findings — which included both Level 2 and Level 3 sex offenders — to EEC, which began an investigation. EEC revoked providers’ licenses in four cases where their operators had full knowledge of the sex offender’s status but never reported the information to EEC.

But Bump’s audit also discovered EEC — whose $197,585 a year commissioner Sherri Killins resigned earlier this month amid a Herald investigation — failed to ensure child-care providers run required CORI checks on staffers.

Some 10 percent of sampled staff CORI checks had either expired or had never been conducted on staffers with unsupervised contact with kids, according to the audit.

EEC also doesn’t hold child care centers accountable for implementing a correction plan after they uncover violations and some weren’t followed up by EEC staff for over two years Bump found.

In a one-year period, EEC didn’t perform a single unannounced inspection of a home-based child-care center, which are required by law, Bump said.

An illegal daycare worker from Wakefield was charged in December with more than 100 charges in a horrifying child sex abuse case.

Meanwhile, Killins resigned earlier this month after a Herald investigation found she was taking a side internship at the Ware Public Schools studying to be a school superintendent and commuting to her state job from her home in New Haven, Conn.

Bump called on EEC to periodically match up the sex offenders’ with the providers’ addresses, and for child care providers to be required to conduct Sex Offender Registry Information checks.

“While I know that EEC has the best intention to fulfill its mission, this audit shows that more can be done to protect young children,” Bump said. “Unfortunately, there is little margin of error as just one case can have dire consequences.”