When Jessie Sook shares the happy news that she is pregnant with her first child, she says the reactions are often the same, especially from other working women professionals.
“Right after you get excited, you’re asked, ‘Are you on the list?'” Sook says.
What they’re asking is whether she signed up for a daycare a few months before the baby, due in June. Schuke, an executive with Kentucky’s vast community and technical school system, said this reflects the growing concerns of working parents about finding affordable, high-quality child care. he said on Tuesday.
More Republicans are treating child care as a workforce issue, driving increased spending
Republican Sen. Danny Carroll announced sweeping legislation Tuesday aimed at strengthening and expanding the child care network across the Bluegrass state. Another aim is to strengthen early childhood education, he said. One long-term goal, he said, is to one day make terms like “child care” and “day care” obsolete and replace them with early childhood education, regardless of the setting or the age of the child.
Carroll is proposing that the state spend $150 million a year on the bill’s child care program in the next two-year budget cycle, which begins July 1. The Republican-controlled Legislature is expected to finalize the next state spending plan within the next month.
“We’re at a time when Kentucky needs to step up and set a shining example for the rest of the country, and if we decide to do that, we’ll reap the benefits,” Carroll said at a news conference. Ta.
Kentucky Sen. Danny Carroll announced details of a bill to expand access to child care and strengthen early childhood education in Kentucky on February 13, 2024 in Frankfort, Kentucky. (AP Photo/Bruce Schreiner)
This bill comes at a time of uncertainty for childcare workers and parents. The $24 billion in pandemic aid Congress passed for child care businesses in 2021 is running out. Republican state lawmakers across the country are responding by supporting child care programs.
Still, the biggest investments in child care have come from Democrats. In New Mexico, the state uses a trust funded by oil and gas production to pay for child care for most children under 5. In Vermont, Democratic lawmakers overrode the Republican governor’s veto and passed a payroll tax increase to fund child care subsidies.
In Kentucky, Carroll said his actions and funding request “will go a long way toward averting the immediate crisis we face if we don’t act with purpose and certainty.”
His bill, called the Horizons Act, would include state aid for families struggling to pay for day care and child care. It would create a fund aimed at increasing the availability of early childhood education services and fostering innovation in early childhood education.
As part of the effort, the state’s community and technical school system will offer an associate’s degree in early childhood education entrepreneurship, with the goal of preparing graduates to run child care centers. Sook expressed the community and technical school system’s readiness to offer additional programs to expand access to child care.
But it was her personal comment about the anxiety of finding childcare that particularly resonated.
“Both federal women and men professionals have to deal with the challenges of learning the exciting news of growing families,” she said.
Carroll’s bill drew widespread praise from business and children’s advocates. Supporters said a strong child care network would improve Kentucky’s low labor force participation rate and make the state more competitive in attracting new businesses.
The bill also received support from Jennifer Washburn, who owns and operates an early childhood education center in Benton, in far western Kentucky.
Washburn said these centers face constant stress over staffing and tuition. With the loss of federal support, many centers face the painful choice of cutting staff salaries, increasing tuition or closing, she said.
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She called Carroll’s bill “an exceptional starting point to address the needs of a broken system.”
Carroll said in an interview that Kentucky will pay a “huge price” if lawmakers fail to address chronic child care problems. That includes placing greater emphasis on early childhood education, he said. Those decisions will be made in the coming weeks, as lawmakers reached the halfway point of their 60-day session on Tuesday.
“Early childhood education is an afterthought in this state and we have to make it a priority,” Carroll said. “If we want to reach the level of education we want, this is where we start. And I think this is where we have missed the boat for years. We have failed to provide as many children as possible with early childhood education.”
