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    Tuesday, November 12, 2024

    Day care prices aren't getting better. So states are stepping in

    Zaneta Billyzone-Jatta smiles at her two-year-old daughter Zakiah Jatta in her classroom at Akin's Early Learning Center in Auburn Tuesday, March 26, 2024 in Auburn, Wash.. Zakiah is enrolled in Washington state's Early ECEAP (Early Childhood Education and Assistance Program). (Ellen M. Banner/The Seattle Times via AP)

    Albuquerque, N.M. — Across the country, the story for families is virtually the same: Child care is unaffordable for many, hard to find for those who can pay, and financially precarious for day care operators and their employees.

    The Biden administration and Congress tried to alleviate some of these problems when the pandemic crippled the child care industry. But as the record $52.5 billion in relief winds down, many states have stepped in with their own solutions.

    States have expanded free preschool and early education and helped more families pay for child care, making it low-cost or even free for many. Recognizing that a federal solution is unlikely to materialize anytime soon, policymakers have come up with novel ways to pay for their plans, creating permanent funding sources that will make new programs sustainable.

    New Mexico, for instance, has tapped into its petroleum revenue, Washington state put a new tax on investment profits, and Kentucky is incentivizing parents to become child care workers.

    And while the largest investments in child care have come from Democrats, Republican state lawmakers across the country are embracing plans to support child care — citing the importance to the economy.

    New Mexico funding makes careers possible

    After she gave birth, Marisshia Sigala put on hold plans to start her real estate career. She and her husband — a personal trainer — lived on one paycheck for about two years and realized the cost of child care would be out of reach even if both were working.

    Then, in 2022, New Mexico made child care free for nearly all the state’s families, amending the constitution to fund early childhood initiatives with money from leasing state land to oil and gas companies.

    The change will bring in an estimated $150 million a year for the early education of children like Mateo. Sigala and her husband qualify because they earn less than 400% of the federal poverty rate, currently about $120,000 a year for a family of four. Mateo is one of more than 21,000 children now benefitting from the subsidies.

    Now Sigala, 32, is back at work while Mateo attends Koala Children’s Academy, which specializes in bilingual education.

    “Being entrepreneurs, it’s a lot more challenging, and we have to rely on ourselves. We don’t have a paycheck coming in every week,” Sigala said. “It’s been a blessing for us.”

    Expanding free child care for families is “making a difference for families in such a profound way," said Elizabeth Groginsky, New Mexico’s early childhood education secretary. And, she said, it's helping the people who care for and educate young kids, too.

    Groginsky and other state leaders are hoping the massive investment will help blunt the effects of poverty.

    “It’s just a really incredible opportunity we have here,” she said.

    Preschool for families in Washington

    Washington state is aiming to offer free preschool to all low-income families, and child care vouchers to all low- and moderate-income families by the end of the decade, along with high-quality care for infants and toddlers with developmental concerns.

    The state is expanding its programs with help from a new 7% tax on profits made from residents’ financial investments — a levy intended to fall on wealthier people.

    When Zaneta Billyzone-Jatta’s daughter Zakiah was born prematurely in 2021, her mother hired a nanny to watch the baby three days a week. A clinical manager for a hospital network, Billyzone-Jatta, 42, had to work while keeping an eye on her daughter the other two days. She felt like she couldn’t give her toddler enough attention, much less address the girl’s developmental concerns like a professional could.

    Through a state program for low-income families and kids with challenges like Zakiah, she now sends her daughter to a child care center near her Seattle-area home, free of cost. There, three teachers supervise seven children in Zakiah’s class and diligently document her progress. Occupational and speech therapists see Zakiah at the school and work closely with the teachers.

    Billyzone-Jatta said Zakiah has made huge strides at the school. She talks about her days in detail and refers to classmates by name. She has learned to interact with other students, drink from an open cup and share.

    “Being a working mother and being able to know that you’re bringing your child to an environment where they’re loved and cared for gives you so much peace,” she said.

    But the program helping infants and toddlers like Zakiah is still small, serving fewer than 200 kids statewide. And in November, Washington voters will have a chance to weigh in on the tax in a referendum that could lead to its repeal, endangering the progress the state has made, child care advocates say.

    “It would be catastrophic,” said Jon Gould, of Akin, the nonprofit that operates Zakiah's state-supported child care center.

    In Kentucky, kids of child care workers attend free

    Rylee Monn, 24, was working at Baptist Health Child Development Center in Lexington when she had her second child, doubling what she paid for her children to attend the same center.

    She thought about quitting and getting a night-shift job so she could stay home and care for her children during the day.

    “All of my paycheck was going to child care,” Monn said.

    Then, in 2023, Kentucky started a program to cover or reduce the cost of day care for parents who work in the child care industry. The program was meant to tackle two challenges at once. Policymakers hoped it would draw more workers into the child care industry, addressing a shortage. And they wanted to provide more low-cost child care for all families.

    Now, more than a dozen states are considering or have already adopted policies modeled after the one in Kentucky, according to EdSurge, a publication that focuses on education.

    The program has helped the state's child care industry recruit workers who might otherwise be working in service jobs.

    Delaney Griffin, 30, was working in a pizza restaurant last year and pondering her next move with her young family. Her child care costs consumed all but $100 of her biweekly check.

    After learning about the child care benefit, she took a job in December with Baptist Health Child Development Center. She now pays about $5 a week. Her older child is in a preschool program.

    “The free child care part was like the biggest reason that I actually got to start in child care,” Griffin said.

    This series on how the child care crisis affects working parents — with a focus on solutions — is produced by the Education Reporting Collaborative, a coalition of eight newsrooms, including AL.com, The Associated Press, The Christian Science Monitor, The Dallas Morning News, The Hechinger Report, Idaho Education News, The Post & Courier, and The Seattle Times.

    Two-year-old Zakiah Jatta points to a photo of her family hanging on the wall in her classroom at Akin's Early Learning Center in Auburn, Wash. Tuesday, March 26, 2024. Zakiah is enrolled in Washington state's Early ECEAP (Early Childhood Education and Assistance Program). (Ellen M. Banner/The Seattle Times via AP)
    Two-year-old Zakiah Jatta holds a doll in her classroom at Akin's Early Learning Center in Auburn, Wash., Tuesday, March 26, 2024. Zakiah is enrolled in Washington state's Early ECEAP (Early Childhood Education and Assistance Program). (Ellen M. Banner/The Seattle Times via AP)
    Zaneta Billyzone-Jatta kisses her two-year-old daughter Zakiah Jatta in her classroom at Akin's Early Learning Center in Auburn, Wash., Tuesday, March 26, 2024. Washington is doing more to help families access and afford child care, but huge gaps remain. Early ECEAP provides free child care and family support services to infants and toddlers from low-income households. But there are only 178 spots funded in the entire state. Some of those spots are at Akin's early learning center in Auburn. (Ellen M. Banner/The Seattle Times via AP)
    Marisshia Sigala secures her son Mateo in his car seat after picking him up after work from the Koala Children's Academy in Albuquerque, New Mexico, on Wednesday, March 20, 2024. Like most other New Mexico families, Sigala and her husband qualify for subsidized child care in New Mexico, providing them more flexibility to see more clients as they build their careers. (AP Photo/Susan Montoya Bryan)
    Mateo Arambula waits for his mother, Marisshia Sigala, to collect his things as she picks him up from Koala Children's Academy after a day of work in Albuquerque, New Mexico, on Wednesday, March 20, 2024. Like most other New Mexico families, Sigala and her husband qualify for subsidized child care in New Mexico, providing them more flexibility to see more clients as they build their careers. (AP Photo/Susan Montoya Bryan)
    Rylee Monn plays with her class at a child care center in Lexington, Ky., Wednesday, March 13, 2024. Monn, who has two children at the center where she works, is taking advantage of a state program that offers free or reduced cost child care to child care workers. Monn says the program saves her family hundreds of dollars a week. (AP Photo/Dylan Lovan)
    Delaney Griffin, center, plays with toddlers at the child care center where she works, Wednesday, March 13, 2024, in Lexington, Ky. Griffin went to work at the center after leaving a restaurant job because she could receive low cost child care for her daughter. Kentucky started a program in 2023 that offers free child or reduced cost care to child care workers. (AP Photo/Dylan Lovan)
    Jenna Carodiskey-Wiebe, assistant teacher with ECEAP, left, plays with two-year-old Zakiah Jatta in her classroom at Akin's Early Learning Center in Auburn, Wash., Tuesday, March 26, 2024. Washington is doing more to help families access and afford child care, but huge gaps remain. Early ECEAP provides free child care and family support services to infants and toddlers from low-income households. But there are only 178 spots funded in the entire state. Some of those spots are at Akin's early learning center in Auburn. (Ellen M. Banner/The Seattle Times via AP)
    Zaneta Billyzone-Jatta smiles at her two-year-old daughter Zakiah Jatta in her classroom at Akin's Early Learning Center in Auburn, Wash., Tuesday, March 26, 2024. Washington is doing more to help families access and afford child care, but huge gaps remain. Early ECEAP provides free child care and family support services to infants and toddlers from low-income households. But there are only 178 spots funded in the entire state. Some of those spots are at Akin's early learning center in Auburn. (Ellen M. Banner/The Seattle Times via AP)
    Jenna Carodiskey-Wiebe, assistant teacher with ECEAP, right, watches as two-year-old Zakiah Jatta plays with Play-Doh in her classroom at Akin's Early Learning Center in Auburn, Wash., Tuesday, March 26, 2024. Washington is doing more to help families access and afford child care, but huge gaps remain. Early ECEAP provides free child care and family support services to infants and toddlers from low-income households. But there are only 178 spots funded in the entire state. Some of those spots are at Akin's early learning center in Auburn. (Ellen M. Banner/The Seattle Times via AP)
    Bulletin board hanging outside of a classroom at Akin's Early Learning Center in Auburn, Wash., Tuesday, March 26, 2024. Washington is doing more to help families access and afford child care, but huge gaps remain. Early ECEAP provides free child care and family support services to infants and toddlers from low-income households. But there are only 178 spots funded in the entire state. Some of those spots are at Akin's early learning center in Auburn. (Ellen M. Banner/The Seattle Times via AP)
    Zaneta Billyzone-Jatta talks about Washington state's Early ECEAP (Early Childhood Education and Assistance Program) Tuesday, March 26, 2024 in Auburn, Wash. In the background, her two-year-old daughter Zakiah Jatta is playing with play dough as her teacher Jenna Carodiskey-Wiebe watches at Akin's Early Learning Center in Auburn, Wash..(Ellen M. Banner/The Seattle Times via AP)

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