When Traci Stith opened the letter last week, it was like a bomb exploded in her living room.
Everything was – and still is – in disarray, she said. She all at once felt panicked, rushed, helpless and afraid.
When Stith, a 25-year-old single mother from Tarboro, read a letter notifying her that her four children were going to be cut from Edgecombe County day care funding, she was speechless.
Now she's just mad. And she's not alone.
The Edgecombe County Department of Social Services last week sent letters to hundreds of parents – mostly single mothers – notifying them that their day care funding was being terminated starting Thursday. For some, it was less than two weeks notice.
"I was devastated," Stith said, shouting into a telephone on Friday from the noisy Tarboro Honda plant where she works. "I've been in a state of depression ever since. I'm trying to figure out what I can do to maintain my job."
She probably won't be able to, she said.
Hundreds more share her dilemma.
As of today, Edgecombe County provides day care services for 977 children. Partially because of reduced funding from the N.C. Division of Child Development, county officials said between 500 to 600 children will lose assistance.
"It was really heart wrenching to make this decision," said Isham Spann, program manager for Edgecombe County Social Services. "We didn't want this. No one wanted this. We sincerely regret having to terminate these children but we don't have any other choice."
The county Department of Social Services received about $120,000 less from the state in 2007 than in 2006, Spann said.
"We delayed this as long as we could," he said Friday. "We actually delayed it too long. We were hoping money would come in and we'd be able to avoid all this, but it didn't."
Edgecombe County received about $3.1 million from the N.C. Division of Child Development in 2007, state officials said.
So how does losing $120,000 out of $3.1 million merit a potential 60 percent reduction in services?
Nancy Guy, the subsidy service section chief with the N.C. Division of Child Development, said the problem isn't as much an issue of funding, but rather an issue of Edgecombe County being overextended to begin with.
"Typically, counties implement a waiting list to get these services," Guy said. "Edgecombe County just now started that. If the county had begun that in August, most of these children wouldn't have been covered to begin with."
State and federal funding for these types of initiatives is limited, Guy said.
That doesn't make Latanya Williams feel any better about it. Williams, 27, has fought to stay off welfare, she said. She works 40 hours a week at Wal-Mart to keep her three children fed and clothed. Paying a few hundred dollars a week for day care isn't really in her budget, she said.
Left with two options – quit her job or leave her children home alone – Williams said she feels cornered.
"I'm passed frustrated," she said. "I don't know what to do. I'm my kids only means of support. I have to keep my head together for the sake of the kids, but it's not easy right now."
Menisa Johnson, a 31-year-old single mother from Tarboro, feels the same. Johnson doesn't know what to do with her 6- and 3-year-olds now that their funding has been cut.
Nevermind that she paid her way through college and graduated with a degree in medical office administration last year. Johnson won't have time to work at a doctor's office if her children don't receive day care services, she said.
"This is the plight these mothers are faced with," said Linda Knight, director of the Think and Grow Childcare Center in Tarboro. "What are these parents to do?"
Knight's day care serves between 90 and 100 county-subsidized children. That number will be cut by more than half after Thursday. Knight's staff will need to be cut, as well, she said.
"I've never had to lay anybody off before," said Knight, who has paid to send some of her 30-or-so employees to college. "My parents are just devastated. Some of the children are from teenage mothers who are trying to go to school. And they are just now finding out. What do we do?"
Learning Stones Child Care Center in Tarboro is expected to lose half of its 30 children next week. Little Angels Childcare Center II in Rocky Mount stands to lose a similar amount.
In the meantime, Spann is urging parents to seek help from Head Start and other local organizations.
That won't work for Williams. Two of her three children are too young for Head Start, she said. Her 2-year-old, Demadian, will probably suffer the most.
"He's developmentally delayed," Williams said. "He's been doing real well with the services provided, but now he won't get that anymore."
Neither will 4-year-old Quantira Farmer or 6-year-old Zaria Johnson. Knight isn't sure what will be done with 3-year-old Zion Hyman or her 8-month-old brother Amad. And what about 4-year-old Zasia, or 5-year-old P'kyria or 6-year-old Keeshon?
"These children will most likely either be left home alone or their mothers will need to quit their jobs," Knight said. "Everyone loses."
The Edgecombe County Department of Social Services, which has been flooded with calls from concerned parents, has scheduled individual hearings for parents wishing to protest the termination of child care services.
"Unfortunately, it's the parents who aren't working and who aren't trying who are going to stay on these services," Williams said from a telephone at Wal-Mart. "I'm working to provide for my children. They want people to get off welfare but they don't give any incentive to. Maybe if I quit my job I'll be eligible for day care again. It's backwards.