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The cost of un-subsidized child care is extraordinarily high, raising sometimes insurmountable barriers to low-income parents who want to work. The community-based child care centers that many low-income families rely on are reimbursed at ridiculously low rates. But there are answers. We need only the will to implement and pay for them. . . . → Read More: No Shortage of Ideas for Better, More Affordable Child Care 
How much money were you making in 2004? Could you survive on that today? Maybe, maybe not. Might be a stretch but hey, times are tough. How about 27% of what you were making in 2004, could you survive on that? Unless 2004 was a real banner year and you made ten times what you’re making today, maintaining your lifestyle on that money would be impossible. If you were making less than the median income for Washington, DC in 2004, then 27% of that amount won’t even meet your basic needs. Yet the DC Government refuses to pay child care providers who accept the city’s subsidized child care vouchers, more than 27% of the rate they should have been paid in 2004. Aaron Brooks, owner of Power To Become Child Care Center and Jeffrey Credit, owner of Community Child Development Center are more than a little peeved about the situation. They let the city council know during a day of lobbying at the Wilson Building headed by Empower DC child care organizer Sequnely Gray. The following video lays out their argument. Despite a $417 million surplus in the city’s budget, Mayor Vincent Gray and the DC City Council are unlikely to increase funding for DC’s subsidized child care program unless someone like you accepts the challenge and makes them change their minds. Contact your city council members and tell them to fund subsidized child care. Here are their phone numbers and email addresses: Councilmember Phil Mendelson (202) 724-8032 pmendelson@dccouncil.us At-Large Councilmember Anita Bonds (202) 724-8064 abonds@dccouncil.us At-Large Councilmember David Grosso (202) 724-8105 dgrosso@dccouncil.us At-Large Councilmember David Catania (202) 724-7772 dcatania@dccouncil.us At-Large Councilmember Vincent Orange (202) 724-8174 vorange@dccouncil.us Ward 1 Councilmember Jim Graham (202) 724-8181 jgraham@dccouncil.us Ward 2 Councilmember Jack Evans (202) 724-8058 jevans@dccouncil.us Ward 3 Councilmember Mary Cheh (202) 724-8062 mcheh@dccouncil.us Ward 4 Councilmember Muriel Bowser (202) 724-8052 mbowser@dccouncil.us Ward 5 Councilmember Kenyan McDuffie (202) 724-8028 kmcduffie@dccouncil.us Ward 6 Councilmember Tommy Wells (202) 724-8072 twells@dccouncil.us Ward 7 Councilmember Yvette Alexander (202) 724-8068 yalexander@dccouncil.us Ward 8 Councilmember Marion Barry (202) 724-8045 mbarry@dccouncil.us 
Child care in Washington DC is vital for a family to work, live, and participate in the community in a positive way. Without proper child care, parents- particularly single parents- may be forced to cut back their work hours, turn down promotions, or even quit their stable jobs. For the children, these early years provide the foundation for their future development; quality child care prepares children for success in school. Child care is increasingly expensive and many families cannot afford it on their own wages. In the District, the average yearly child care cost for an infant/toddler is $18,200. These are clear facts that have been widely documented. So then why is funding for subsidies continually cut? Why are reimbursement rates for providers so low that they can’t afford to provide high quality care? Child care advocates all over the District have been working for years to right the funding wrongs of the Office of State Superintendent of Education (OSSE). Funding for the child care subsidy program has been slashed dramatically while the need for these subsidies continues to grow at a steady pace. Last year, the council passed a budget that cut $5.7 million; in the last five years subsidies have been cut nearly $30 million. This is 1,600 families that were unable to participate in the subsidy program. This is 1,600 families who could not get child care. This year, in the Mayor’s released budget, the child care subsidy/voucher program made it to #1 on his wish list. Child care should not be a “wish” because the money is there. The District has enough funds and new sources of revenue to restore the money that has been taken away from this program. In fiscal year 2014, the childcare subsidy/voucher program will lose another 1.5 million dollars due to sequestration. This budget cut affects about 80 more families who need childcare subsidies to work, attend school and seek employment. However, the District of Columbia has the money to replace what is being cut. DC has generated over 400 million dollars of extra revenue for the city in the past year but they put all of it in the bank. Meanwhile, parents are still having challenges getting childcare vouchers and their children are missing out on an early start in education. The mayor and his team regularly say how much they care about families and, in particular, vulnerable children in this city. They sure have a funny way of showing it. Now it’s up to the Council to plug the leak in childcare subsidies. We need to restore the lost funding for childcare subsidies and give higher reimbursement rates for childcare providers. Because DC doesn’t work without childcare. 
Cross-Posted from the Washington Post written by Brigid Schulte At 6:30 a.m. on a Wednesday early this month, Andria Swanson, dressed in a bright-pink terry cloth jumpsuit, joined a line that was already snaking down South Capitol Street in Congress Heights. She nervously counted the people ahead of her. “I’m number 19,” she said. “That means I’ll get in today.” At number 20, she said, caseworkers close the doors and tell you to come back another day. Ahead of her in line, Joelle Flythe had been waiting, for the third day in a row, since 5 a.m. The first person in line had arrived at 3:45 a.m. This was Swanson’s second trip of the week to the Congress Heights Service Center, the only place run by the city where poor and working-poor parents can apply for a subsidy to help pay for child care. It will not be her last. Over the past two years, Swanson said, she has repeatedly waited in line at this office, once for more than nine hours as she missed work and college classes. She’s made multiple trips after caseworkers told her she needed more paperwork. At one point, she said, she missed so much work trying to get the child-care subsidy that she lost her job, landed in a shelter and went on welfare. Last month, Swanson began a job for the grass-roots advocacy nonprofit group Empower DC, tasked with helping improve the very subsidy process she has found so frustrating. So on this particular morning, she asked another mother to hold her place in line while she interviewed people about their experiences and asked them to sign a petition to improve the system. “This process is hell,” Swanson said. “H-E-L-L.” It’s never been easy for low-income parents in the District to secure high-quality child care. But now the stakes are very high. This fall, the District will begin limiting how long families can stay on welfare to five years. Liberals and conservatives agree that affordable child care is essential in moving people off welfare and into jobs and in helping them keep those jobs. But that goal is greatly complicated by the realities of the city’s child-care subsidy program — with its counterproductive system for receiving and renewing benefits, its inadequate funding for the subsidies themselves and the lack of child-care centers willing to accept the vouchers. City officials agree that the system is flawed. “The process needs a lot of fixing,” said David Berns, director of the Department of Human Services. As many as 25,000 people apply for child-care subsidies every year, he said, but the city has only seven caseworkers to determine eligibility. Berns said he has successfully lobbied for funding from the Division of Early Learning to increase staff at the Congress Heights Service Center by seven or eight. His department also hopes to begin streamlining the subsidy process next fall, he said. And in two years, he said, a new computer system should enable parents to apply for subsidies online. “We have a real sense of urgency,” said Deborah Carroll, director of DHS’s Economic Security Administration. “You can’t get a job if you can’t put your kid in child care. CLICK HERE to read the entire article at the WashingtonPost.com. I’ve reposted the comments that followed the above Washington Post article because they represent the kind of mentality that helps keep DC Government from fully funding the subsidized child care program. I hope they are not representative of all Washington Post readers. They’re actually difficult to find (I had to click on the photo gallery to get to them) which may explain why only seven people commented. I’m just using the abbreviations for those posters who used their real names. Baby Huey in the City wrote: STOP having babies, if you CAN’T take care of them! It’s that simple ABS wrote: She just stuck her foot in her mouth… How can she receive Unemployment, is currently employed, has an employed fiance AND receive public assistance–AND STILL COMPLAINING? Hummm…. cr1957ny wrote: I still do not understand how someone who is 22 or 23 years old and doesn’t have a pot to go in has 2-3 kids already. It just seems really irresponsible, and why should others have to support that irresponsibility? If you don’t have a job that pays well enough to support a child, stop having them! Get married. I mean, really. I feel bad for the kids, but this constant subculture thing about popping babies out with . . . → Read More: In D.C., parents miss work, lose jobs trying to get child-care subsidy  Comments are closed  Childcare, Social Services  Andria Swanson, Brigid Schulte, child care, Empower DC, subsidized child care, Washington Post 
On May 14, 2012, members of Empower DC’s Child Care for All Campaign along with their children-otherwise known as the BABY BRIGADE-visited the Wilson Building to educate the city council on the importance of the child care subsidy/voucher program and the challenges community-based child care centers are having on a day to day basis to keep their businesses running. The child care subsidy/voucher program is a federally funded program that was designed to subsidize child care for working families and parents that want to continue their education or seek employment. As we visited council office after council office with our babies, we were puzzled as to why no one really cared about child care. We got the same answers over and over, “we are focused on getting extra money for the TANF program so that we can get these 6,000 families assessed and back to work or school.” No one even stopped to think that most or all of those TANF families will need subsidized child care to go back to work or school. Even with working parents, providers and teen parents from Anacostia’s New Heights Teen Parents Program expressing the challenges we’ve had finding available slots for our children in child care centers, making ends meet and completing the intake process, we were still unable to get solid support on restoring the budget for child care and making the intake process more accessible. Despite our efforts, the mayor’s proposed $5.7 million dollar cut from the child care subsidy voucher program was voted into law on June 5, 2012. This budget cut will affect about 400 hundred families who won’t have access to a voucher or will be in jeopardy of loosing their voucher. The budget cut will also make it even harder for community-based and family child development centers contracted by the Office of the State Superintendent (OSSE) to operate and provide quality child care. Mainly the community-based centers will suffer. It is very clear that the mayor and the city council don’t know or understand the value of early care and education BEFORE KINDERGARTEN! So, it is our job as parents, providers and community members to work harder to educate these city officials and stand up and advocate for our little people. They are our future leaders and we have to make sure they have the proper tools and support they need to be successful. LISTEN UP!!! DC DOESN’T WORK WITHOUT CHILD CARE!!! SO, LET’S STRENGTHEN OUR COMMUNITIES AND SUPPORT COMMUNITY-BASED CHILD CARE CENTERS!! In addition to lobbying the council in their offices, Child Care for All Campaign members Sequnely Gray, Toneisha Johnson and Shantise Summers also testified during the city council’s budget hearing on human services. Coucilmember Jim Graham, Chair of the Committee on Human Services, seemed to agree that the intake process needs improvement. On the otherhand, his implication that providing a subsidy so that parents can meet their child care needs is like providing substance abuse treatment to drug addicts is nuts. In the District of Columbia, child care typically costs $18,200 per year, per child. You don’t have to be anything like a drug addict to need help meeting those costs. For more information and/or to join Empower DC’s Child Care For All Campaign, contact Sequnely Gray at childcare@empowerdc.org or call 202-234-9119 ext. 103. |
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