Working parents are having a hard time affording quality child care because of the economic downturn, according to a report from a national child-care advocacy organization.
In "Parents and the High Price of Child Care: 2009 Update," the National Association of Child Care Resource and Referral Agencies found that families are paying more per month for child care than they are for food and the average cost of other household expenses.
"The cost of quality child care is out of reach for too many families," said Linda Smith, executive director of the association, in a statement. "No parent should have to choose a poor-quality child-care setting just because they cannot afford anything better for their children."
Smith said it's time to increase public investment in improving the quality of care for families.
Earlier this year the association ranked Alabama near the bottom -- 42nd in the nation -- for its oversight and regulation of child-care facilities. This new report suggests that more people might be seeking more affordable child care in places that operate without state regulations.
"As a result of increasing child-care costs and the current economy, some parents have been forced to remove their children from organized child-care programs, or licensed settings, and place them in more informal settings," Smith said. "This potentially means that the provider has not had a background check or training in health and safety practices,
or early childhood development, let alone training to provide age-appropriate activities."
It's a trend child-care advocates are seeing in Alabama particularly as a program that subsidizes day-care costs for low-income parents remains in limbo.
More than 27,000 low-income Alabama children receive access to child care because of the state Department of Human Resources program, but budget cuts put thousands of slots on the chopping block this year. Stimulus money from the federal government saved the program, but what will happen when that funding runs out is anybody's guess. The program is designed to help low-income parents stay in the work force by ensuring that they have access to child care.
Tania Lang Burger, organization development coordinator for the Federation of Child Care Centers of Alabama Inc., said parents who have children eligible for the subsidy program increasingly are being asked to pay a bigger co-pay.
"We're down lower than we've been in many years," Burger said.
Lillie Hood, owner of a home-based operation in Montgomery called All My Children, said as a licensed provider she tries to keep her fees competitive, but it's tough.
She said the reimbursement she receives from DHR barely covers what she puts into making her home a good learning environment for the children she serves.
Hood, who has been in child care for 20 years, said licensed providers increasingly have to have education and training in early childhood development.
She said she wishes the state would bookend what it's doing with providers by insisting on parental involvement and education.
"We've seen a lot of changes in the program, but it's never enough," she said. "I guess it's never enough when it comes to children."
The Federation of Child Care Centers of Alabama (FOCAL) produced a study of its own this year that found the state's dual system of licensed and unlicensed child-care providers is jeopardizing the health and safety of some of the state's most vulnerable residents.
Conducted in conjunction with the Oakland, Calif.-based Applied Research Center, the study points out that 40 percent of Alabama's 2,000 child-care centers in the state are unlicensed. Being unlicensed means that these centers receive no inspection, no regulation and no monitoring by the state even though children whose care is subsidized with government money are enrolled in them.
Burger said not all unlicensed child-care centers are bad, but there's really no way to know because no one is checking to make sure they're any good. She added that these centers tend to have lower fees because they're not spending the money it takes to meet minimum standards. The study also noted that the number of unlicensed centers has increased while the number of those that are licensed has decreased.
"I'm very sympathetic to low-income parents who are in a real bind," Burger said. "You choose what you can afford, even if the situation is an underground situation."
Sankey, a nearly 25-year veteran of the child-care business, said the state should be concerned about what is happening to those children if they're not coming to day care, and how it could impact the state's work force.
"One reason for child care is to educate our children, and another is to make sure that they are in a nurturing environment," she said. "The third reason child care is there is so that working parents will have some place for their children to be."
Sankey said when day care becomes unaffordable for working parents they either put children in less expensive places with lower standards, or worse. They leave children at home unattended or with someone who shouldn't be caring for them.
"I would hate to even imagine what is going on with some of our children who are left home by themselves," she said. "I wonder if there will be a rise in abuse because parents don't have a safe place for their children to go while they're at work."
Sankey said she hopes the state will use the $38 million in stimulus funding that it is getting for child care over the next two years to help parents and reduce the waiting list of eligible children waiting for child care.
Full text available at The Montgomery Advertiser.