Fact Sheet on Need to Increase Federal  Funding for Child Care and Head Start

(Courtesy National Women's Law Center, June 2010)
 

An increase of $1 billion for the Child Care and Development Block Grant (CCDBG) and $1 billion for Head Start and Early Head Start are essential to address longstanding gaps in these programs and ensure that families have access to early care and education options that enable parents to work and prepare children for school.

The CCDBG, Head Start, and Early Head Start play a critical role in helping children learn and their families work. Yet these programs lacked sufficient resources even prior to the current recession.  American Recovery and Reinvestment Act (ARRA) funds provided for the programs have been crucial in enabling them to help children and families in states and communities across the country.

·         High-quality, affordable child care and early education helps parents work, children learn, and strengthens the nation?s economy.

-   A study by the Economic Policy Institute found that single mothers of young children who received child care assistance were 39 percent more likely to still be employed after two years and former welfare recipients were 82 percent more likely to still be employed after two years than those who did not receive any help paying for child care.[i]

-   The licensed child care sector allows parents to work and earn more than $100 billion annually.  These additional wages supported by the child care sector, in turn, generate nearly $580 billion in total direct, indirect, and induced labor income, approximately $69 billion in tax revenues, and more than 15 million jobs.[ii]

-   The Cost, Quality, and Child Outcomes in Child Care Centers study found that children who had enrolled in high-quality child care demonstrated greater mathematical ability and thinking and attention skills, and experienced fewer behavior problems than other children in second grade.  These findings held true for all children, although high-quality care had particularly strong positive impacts on at-risk children.[iii]

·         The CCDBG, Head Start, and Early Head Start play a critical role in helping children and families. 

-   Over 2 million children receive child care assistance, which helps relieve a financial burden for families struggling with the high cost of care, enables parents to afford child care they need to work, and increases children?s access to safe, supportive child care.  Child care funding also helps child care providers by supporting training and other quality improvement efforts and providing the resources they need to sustain their businesses. 

-   Head Start, the nation?s premier early childhood program, helps parents find jobs and gives our poorest children the early learning experience they need to begin school ready to succeed and be productive workers in the future. Head Start and Early Head Start, which served over 900,000 infants, toddlers, and preschoolers in 2008, have been shown to improve children?s short- and long-term educational and health outcomes.

·         Even prior to the current recession, child care, Head Start, and Early Head Start programs lacked sufficient resources. 

-   CCDBG funding was virtually flat between FY 2002 and FY 2008.  As a result, many states had restrictive eligibility criteria, long waiting lists, and/or inadequate provider payment rates for their child care assistance programs.  Only one out of six eligible children received federal child care assistance in 2006[iv]?the most recent year for which data are available?and the unmet need has only grown since then as the eligible population has increased and number of children receiving assistance has declined. 

-   Head Start and Early Head Start experienced a 13 percent real cut in funding from FY 2002 to FY 2008.  As a result, programs were forced to lay off critical program staff, cut back on the number of children served, eliminate some supportive services for families, and reduce transportation.  Prior to the new funding provided as part of the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act (ARRA), only about half of preschoolers eligible for Head Start and less than 3 percent of infants and toddlers eligible for Early Head Start were able to participate,[v] and the ARRA funding will only slightly reduce the number of unserved children.

·          ARRA funds have helped children and families in states and communities across the country.

-   Head Start and Early Head Start are opening new classrooms and will serve over 64,000 additional children. 

-   Over 9,000 children in Arizona and 3,000 children in Alabama have been prevented from losing their child care assistance.

-   Connecticut is providing child care assistance to the 3,800 families on its waiting list.

-   New Jersey is providing child care assistance to children on its waiting list, which had 6,000 children on it as of August 2009.  More than 3,000 children had been removed from the list as of January 2010, and the list continues to be reduced. 

-   Georgia is serving an additional 5,000 to 8,000 children per month, and the state?s waiting list has decreased from nearly 2,200 families as of February 2009 to approximately 800 families as of November 2009.

-   Minnesota is removing nearly 400 families per month from its waiting list for child care assistance.  The state is also covering caseload increases for child care assistance while preventing reductions in eligibility limits, increases in parent copayments, and cuts in providers? reimbursement rates.   

-   Pennsylvania is reducing its waiting list for child care assistance, which had 6,000 children on it as of January 2010.

-   Rhode Island is continuing to guarantee child care assistance to families earning up to 180 percent of poverty.

-   Iowa is providing child care assistance to families with incomes between 145 percent of poverty (the income limit for its existing child care assistance program) and 185 percent of poverty who need help with the costs of high-quality infant and toddler care.

-   Illinois is reducing copayments for families receiving child care assistance by 15 percent.

-   Several states?including Delaware, Illinois, Indiana, Louisiana, Missouri, North Carolina, and Texas?are extending the period during which families can look for work while receiving child care assistance.

·         While ARRA funds helped many states delay or avoid cuts, states will not be able to continue holding off cuts without additional funding.

-   Oregon used ARRA funds to maintain prior improvements in its eligibility limits, parent copayments, and provider reimbursement rates for child care assistance.  However, beginning October 1, 2010, only families who have left Temporary Assistance for Needy Families (TANF) because they are now employed will be eligible for child care assistance.  As a result, over 4,600 working parents who earn less than 185 percent of poverty will lose their child care assistance.

-   Arkansas will run out of ARRA child care funding as of June 30, 2010, and will then have to add about 5,000 children to its waiting list for child care assistance, which already has 5,000 children on it. 

This is the “Dear Colleague” letter Co-Written by our own Senator Olympia Snowe, encouraging her fellow Senators to support increases in both Federal Spending for Child Care and Head Start.  We are now encouraging all Senators to add their names to this letter.

The following is a “Dear Colleague Letter” circulated in through the House of Representatives (Representative Chellie Pingree and Representative Mike Michaud), urging the chairs of the House Appropriations committee  to increase Federal Spending for Child Care by $1 million and for Head Start by an additional $1 Million.  Please note that both Maine Representatives have signed onto this requests.  If you have time, please take a moment to e-mail our two Representatives to thank them for their effort to help children and families in Maine.

Support Investments in Our Children: CCDBG & Head Start

Dear Chairman Obey and Ranking Member Tiahrt:

We respectfully request that you include $1 billion increase for the Child Care and Development Block Grant (CCDBG) and a $1 billion increase for Head Start and Early Head Start in the fiscal year 2011 Labor, Health and Human Services, Education and Related Agencies appropriations bill. These two programs are essential to our country’s efforts to support parents’ employment and help our children arrive at kindergarten with the skills they need to succeed in school and in life.

Child care fees are now often the highest or second highest cost in a family budget. In these challenging economic times, it is especially important to help families afford stable child care so parents can get and keep a job. Unfortunately, only about one in seven children eligible for Federal child care assistance receives help under the Child Care Development Block Grant. We urge you to include a $1 billion increase in CCDBG so that we do not reduce the number of children currently served by this important program. High quality child care also contributes to children’s school readiness: research finds that children from birth through age five in higher quality care score higher on assessments of cognitive skills, language ability, vocabulary, short-term memory and attention than children in lower quality care. CCDBG helps low-income families afford care that can support their children’s development.

Head Start is central to our country’s effort to help low-income children arrive at kindergarten ready to succeed. It combines early education, health care, social services, and nutrition services with a strong focus on parent involvement and support and builds on the strengths of local communities. A $1 billion increase in Head Start will keep classrooms open and provide comprehensive support for the almost 65,000 children who receive Head Start and Early Head Start services as a result of the investments in ARRA.

Whether or not America’s most vulnerable young children and their families will reach their potential depends in large part on our investment in these programs, and so, once again, we respectfully ask that you consider our request. 

Sincerely,

If you click on the PDF icon to the right, you can download an analysis the potential benefits for the Pre-School child in the Federal Elementary and Secondary Education Act (ESEA), currently being debated in Congress, once again from our friends a the Center for Law and Social Policy (CLASP).