(The Center Square) – As California struggles with a projected $18 billion deficit and federal cuts to state-run programs, child care advocates Wednesday urged state lawmakers to allocate more money to help parents of young children.
Legislators heard concerns from parents and child care providers during a committee meeting as looming federal cuts and the state’s budget woes threaten publicly-funded child care programs that hundreds of thousands of California’s families rely on.
“Child care is not a luxury in California,” Assemblymember Gregg Hart, D-Santa Barbara and chair of the Assembly Budget Subcommittee on Accountability and Oversight, said during opening remarks at Wednesday morning’s meeting. “It allows parents to work, businesses to operate and kids to thrive. For many California families, child care costs are one of the primary parameters in the affordability crisis.”
The remarks come weeks after the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services froze federal child care and family assistance funds for five states – California, Colorado, Illinois, Minnesota and New York – because of allegations of fraud and misuse of taxpayer dollars. Three programs funded by the department, including the Child Care and Development Fund, Temporary Assistance for Needy Families and the Social Services Block Grant, were all frozen in the five Democratically-led states.
A total of $10.6 billion was cut from the three programs across the five states, according to the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services. The funds to each of the five states were frozen out of concerns that the benefits went to those who aren’t eligible to receive them under federal law. States that want to continue to receive those funds have to submit extensive documentation, the department announced.
The freeze could affect 3.2 million Californians, state officials testified on Wednesday.
The severe cuts in federally-funded child care programs in California could result in devastating effects on low-income parents who rely on that money to come through so they can have reliable child care, according to public testimony during the committee meeting. Money provided through the state through these programs allow recipients to work, go to school and even pay family members to provide appropriate child care for their family, advocates testified.
Those federal funds help pay for state-run programs like CalWorks, which provides financial assistance to California families to pay for rent, housing, food, utilities, medical expenses and clothing, according to the program’s website.
“None of this would have been possible without the support of child care and CalWorks,” Marilynda Bustamante, a single mom with a 2-year-old daughter, testified during the hearing. “I receive child care through CalWorks. When I heard the current administration is trying to freeze funding for child care, it made me feel like everything I worked so hard to build is about to crumble.”
According to the California Department of Social Services, which oversees programs like CalWorks, approximately 38,843 children and families relied on money from the federally-funded Temporary Assistance for Needy Families program during fiscal year 2018-19. Additionally, the state uses $10 million alone in TANF money to pay for meal reimbursements at child care centers.
State officials who oversee publicly-funded child care programs testified Wednesday that state funds that pay for these programs see a return on investment in the amount of $7 to $12 for every dollar spent on child care.
“Child care is a smart investment,” Jennifer Troia, the director of the California Department of Social Services, testified on Wednesday. “We intend to do everything we can to protect Californian families, children and child care providers from the federal government’s chaotic and harmful actions.”
