 |
|
Calendar
|
| << |
>> |
| |
|
|
1 |
2 |
3 |
4 |
| 5 |
6 |
7 |
8 |
9 |
10 |
11 |
| 12 |
13 |
14 |
15 |
16 |
17 |
18 |
| 19 |
20 |
21 |
22 |
23 |
24 |
25 |
| 26 |
27 |
28 |
29 |
30 |
|
|
|
|
|
Who's Online
|
There are currently, 23 guest(s) and 0 member(s) that are online.
You are Anonymous user. You can register for free by clicking here
|
|
|  |
Showing stories 1 - 15 of 52.
CA - Budget deadlock imperils child care
Submitted by kkurth. Posted on Wednesday, August 08 @ 10:44:13 EDT by kkurth
|
|
A local child-care provider says the state's budget stalemate has it on the verge of shutting down.
Like other facilities in California that provide care for thousands of low-income and developmentally disabled children, Child Care Information Service, a state-licensed child-care placement agency in Pasadena, owes its day-care center and home-care providers around $300,000 as of this month, Executive Director Cristina Alvarado said.
The agency, which relies on state vouchers to pay providers who care for 500 area children, will have no way to pay out that money, Alvarado added.
"We will not get paid, and all we can ask the child-care providers to do is to accept an IOU," she said.
Alvarado said home-care providers who can care for up to six children are among the hardest hit. Many have said they will have to remove state-subsidized children from their care, or shut down their facilities entirely, until the budget is passed, Alvarado said.
It's a refrain being heard around California as the state enters its 39th day without an approved budget.
State Controller John Chiang said the budget stalemate prohibited him from paying an estimated $1.1 billion in July to community colleges, special education programs, nursing homes, cancer detection programs and small businesses that provide services to the state.
Based on last year's payments, he predicted he will be forced to withhold another $2.1 billion in total funds this month if the budget impasse continues.
So far, Chiang's office said it has been forced to withhold $300 million in child development program funds that go to schools and private pre-school and day-care programs under contract with the Department of Education.
Without a budget, the department has no authority to cut checks to its programs, he said.
"This is real money, owed to real people and real programs," Chiang said in a statement.
"Some have been able to weather the non-payments by raiding their savings accounts, or taking out loans. But we're getting to the dangerous point where the lack of these funds is going to have a detrimental effect on individuals and programs," he said.
Child Care Information Services has been forced to take out $500,000 in bank loans just to cover its administrative expenses, Alvarado said.
"But it would be impossible to take out a loan large enough to pay providers," she said. "There's no way we can borrow enough to pay the providers. No bank in the world would do that."
General child-care and development programs are state and federally funded programs that place children in centers and home networks. They provide child-development services for children from birth through 8 years old, as well as older children with special needs.
The state government reimburses these agencies for up to
90 percent of their expenses.
Full text available at the Pasadena Star-News
|
CA - Budget standoff: Child care feels heat
Submitted by kkurth. Posted on Wednesday, August 01 @ 11:38:29 EDT by kkurth
|
|
On a playground in Natomas on Tuesday, two preschool boys argued over a scooter, much as Democrats and Republicans have been bickering over the long-overdue state budget in the Senate.
The dispute ended with a quick resolution, which is what recipients of subsidized child care, providers and their workers are hoping for as the Legislature's budget impasse enters its second month today.
Child care centers haven't been paid by the state for the month of July -- and even if a budget deal is reached soon, checks won't go out until the end of August, industry officials say.
"Already child care centers around the state are at risk of closing their doors to families if a budget isn't signed soon," said Donita Stromgren, policy director for the California Child Care Resource & Referral Network.
There were some signs of progress at the Capitol, meanwhile. Senate Republicans met with Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger in his office and then retreated to a private meeting without him. Senate President Pro Tem Don Perata called a Senate floor session for 6 p.m. today.
But Senate Republican leader Dick Ackerman said only that talks over the budget, which was due with the new fiscal year on July 1, were continuing.
He said Republicans stand ready to help facilities that truly need money get by during the budget delay.
"A lot of those complaints are not founded," he said. "Of the ones that may be directly impacted, we have offered to sponsor ... emergency appropriations to handle situations when they don't have the reserves and are totally dependent day-by-day on state funding."
More than 250,000 low-income families in California, including 11,000 in Sacramento County, depend on subsidized child care so they can work, officials said during a news conference at the Beanstalk preschool program at American Lakes Elementary School in Natomas.
Officials say another 24,000 people work in child care centers that receive state subsidies and are at risk of being laid off.
With an eligibility waiting list of over 300,000 children, affordable child care is difficult enough to find under the best of circumstances.
Kathy Lafferty, who represents child care centers for the Child Development Administrators Association, said "parents have a right to be afraid."
"In past years, with late budgets, centers have closed in August and many of them have not reopened, which is a huge loss to low-income communities," Lafferty said.
Full text available at the Sacremento Bee
|
TX - Some families struggle to find and pay for child-care services
Submitted by kkurth. Posted on Wednesday, July 25 @ 11:01:39 EDT by kkurth
|
|
Terri Rushing dreads the day she gets her next raise.
The single mother of three children, an 11-year-old and 10-year-old twins, Rushing receives child-care assistance from Tarrant County Child Care Management Services, a Texas Workforce Commission program that helps working parents become self-sufficient.
Her day-care expenses are about $1,170 a month during the summer. She pays $235.
A raise of more than $500 annually would push Rushing over the income cap, ending her child-care subsidies.
Even with assistance, Rushing, 49, is barely making it with an annual income of $27,600. Just last month she had only $96 to last for two weeks after paying rent, day care, $30 for gasoline and $50 worth for groceries.
Rushing's struggle is familiar in a country where the proportion of children living with single mothers has increased steadily from 8 percent in 1960 to 23 percent in 2006, according to the report The Feminization of Poverty by the YWCA and the J. McDonald Williams Institute. These families are more likely to be poor. In 2005, 36.2 percent of single mothers lived in poverty compared with 17.6 percent for single fathers and 6.5 percent for married couples with children, according to the report.
To keep costs down, Rushing hurries from her job as a trainer at the Gaylord Texan Resort and Conference Center about 6:15 p.m. each weekday to pick up her children. She can't be late because at 6:30, the day care will start charging her $1 a minute.
"I work until the last second," she said. "Having to pick them up makes me seem unavailable for work and not flexible."
During the summer, the Rushing children have to stay at the center from 7 a.m. to 6:30 p.m., and the cost of day care goes up $150 for field trips.
"If they had a choice, they would rather not go there," Rushing said. "We just don't have any other option."
When single father Vedat Lika of Fort Worth was unemployed for eight months, he constantly worried about how he could afford the high cost of child care for his two 5-year-old children while searching for a job.
Lika, 52, considered enrolling his children in the federally funded, preschool Head Start program. But he said he didn't qualify because he had earned $32,500 a year before being laid off from managing a cafeteria in Arlington.
He looked at getting day care through the Tarrant County Child Care Management Services, the county's largest provider of subsidized care. To qualify, a parent must be employed or going to school at least 25 hours a week. If there are two parents, each must be employed or attending school. Lika was unemployed.
"That is something that some of our parents do voice a concern on, and we totally understand that. But that's one of those policies and procedures that have been in place with the state," said Patricia Walker Looper, director of the Tarrant County program.
"The whole point of this program is for them to get to the point where they can provide for this on their own, and we do have some great success stories," she said.
So Lika relied on the kindness of neighbors and friends, or paid for day care with a credit card, which contributed to a $17,000 tab he's now paying off. Sometimes he took his children on job interviews.
"I know that cost me some jobs, but what could I do?" he said.
He turned down several job offers because the $10 an hour salary range wasn't enough to pay for child care.
Since Lika got his job May 1 working for the Tarrant Area Food Bank, paying for child care is a bit easier. He earns about $40,000 a year teaching low-income adults how to cook for a living.
He pays the Little Shepherd Children's Center in Arlington about $1,000 a month to care for his son, Arman, and daughter, Madison.
This fall, Lika's children plan to attend the East Fort Worth Montessori school, where Lika teaches his classes. But there is always next summer when the school is closed. He will have to worry about paying for day care again.
"If you are going to take care of children, you do the best that you can," Lika said.
Full text available at the Star-Telegram
|
KY - Governor announces elimination of child care co-pays
Submitted by kkurth. Posted on Friday, July 20 @ 10:46:23 EDT by kkurth
|
|
Governor Ernie Fletcher and officials from the Kentucky Cabinet for Health and Family Services (CHFS) have announced an infusion of $45 million to the state’s Child Care Assistance Program (CCAP) to make child care more affordable and simplify the process for providers.
CHFS will dedicate $45 million of federal child care assistance funds to CCAP over four years. Beginning in January 2008, the policy change will tie calculation of the co-pays to federal poverty guidelines and eliminate co-pays for about 6,500 families with income up to and including 100 percent of federal poverty guidelines.
Most families currently enrolled in the CCAP are responsible for co-pays that are based on income guidelines. After the change, a one-parent, two-child family enrolled in CCAP and making no more than $1,431 monthly would qualify and would save about $120 each month.
“With this transformation of the Child Care Assistance Program, we are improving the quality of life for thousands of families across the state,” said CHFS Deputy Secretary Tom Emberton Jr. “The change supports the cabinet’s goal of helping families obtain and maintain employment by allowing them to keep more of their income for other expenses. This will make a real, much-needed difference in the lives of those who depend on this program.”
Child care providers will also benefit from the change. Simplifying the co-pay assessment alleviates the administrative tracking and collection efforts of the state’s approximately 2,200 child care operators. It will also reduce the occurrence of improper or late payments.
Full text available at the News-Democrat and Leader
|
CO - Child-care maze cheats recipients
Submitted by kkurth. Posted on Thursday, July 12 @ 09:29:24 EDT by kkurth
|
|
In Colorado, 64 different rule books apply to child-care assistance for the state's working poor, each with its own eligibility standards, reimbursement rates and provider pay schedules.
Some counties pay child-care subsidies for single mothers enrolled in job-training programs while others only pay for care if a parent is at a paying job.
Some expedite applications to make sure parents can get their kids enrolled quickly when a job opportunity arises and others dawdle for weeks while the job slips away.
Some pay child-care workers a living wage; others don't come close.
It's a crapshoot - with the welfare of the state's most vulnerable children on the line.
In an effort to preserve a concept of local control that's tantamount to a religion, the state has created a monster of bumbling inefficiency and unequal treatment in the administration of critical child-care assistance.
Top it off with the news this week that $60 million in federal and state money for child care for the poor is sitting around unspent in county slush funds while thousands of Colorado children get substandard care - or none at all - and what we have here is great material for Michael Moore's next scathing documentary.
He could call it "Cheapo."
Now, none of this issue is easy to understand, what with abbreviations like TANF and CCAP littering budget documents everywhere, but it becomes mind-numbingly obtuse when you try to comprehend the bureaucratic labyrinth multiplied by a factor of 64.
So let's just consider some of the consequences of a system of local control that's layered atop federal and state programs designed To End Welfare As We Know It:
A single parent in one county can make 185 percent of the poverty line and receive a child-care subsidy while a family in another county will be denied help if its income is 151 percent of the same poverty line.
A child-care center in Denver that provides the same services to children who come from Adams, Jefferson, Arapahoe or Douglas counties will receive payments at wildly different rates - and not incidentally squander its director's time managing all manner of complex bills and applications.
A family that moves from one county to another will have to reapply for child-care subsidies and risk ineligibility even though nothing but its address may have changed.
The list goes on.
Now, one thing that is consistent statewide is that the application process is so convoluted it makes getting a mortgage look easy, and in most cases it requires re-certification every six months or more often if the parent's work hours change or - heaven forbid - she gets a 30-cent-an-hour raise.
Then there are the quirks that make anybody who has ever relied on child care break out in a cold sweat just thinking about them, such as the rule that says a subsidy for a toddler stops if the mother has another baby and takes maternity leave.
This means that the toddler must give up his place in preschool and risk losing it permanently while his mother takes six weeks off to be with a newborn. Then the mother must reapply and wait for certification all over again before she can return to work.
All this is nutty enough, but the suggestion that the $60 million surplus in funds for child-care subsidies is because all the kids who need care are getting it is truly whacked.
The Colorado Children's Campaign estimates that 62 percent of children under 6 live in families where the parents work outside the home.
Of the families that would be eligible for child-care subsidies in most Colorado counties because they earn 175 percent of the poverty line or less, only about 14.7 percent of the kids have access to child-care assistance.
That number has dropped from 18.5 percent in 2000.
Full text available at the Denver Post
|
DE - Parents, teachers question commitment to child care
Submitted by kkurth. Posted on Tuesday, July 03 @ 11:47:59 EDT by kkurth
|
|
Deborah Thompson, owner of Mrs. T's Day Care, has a sign on the door of her Union Street children's center assuring parents that their kids will receive tender love and care.
She wants to give them more, but Thompson can't afford a better educational program because the state covers only a portion of what it costs her to care for children whose parents cannot afford day care.
Enrollment at Mrs. T's costs private customers $140 a week, but the state provides Thompson with only $110 in reimbursement for infants and less than $100 for children. Five of the 11 children she cares for, ranging from infancy to 7 years old, are subsidized by the state.
Thompson employs three caregivers and would like to pay them more, but budget constraints make that impossible.
"There's not really a whole lot that you can cut back on except salaries," Thompson said. "Because you don't want to cut back on care."
Providers of subsidized day care also say that meager state reimbursements limit the number of such children they admit. Parents can find spots, but often not at the most convenient or preferable centers.
That's important to parents such as Loretta Maldonado, a single mother who used to go to work each morning wondering whether her son Kevin would be safe, if he would be fed healthy food or if caregivers would remember to give him his asthma medication, which sometimes they didn't.
Kevin, 6, now attends St. Michael's School and Nursery on East Walnut Street in Wilmington with help from a state subsidy, allowing Maldonado to go to work knowing that he's well cared for and educated.
"I want my kid to have a good education," Maldonado said. "Find the money. There's got to be some help out there."
Thompson said she doesn't think day care and early childhood education are high priorities for the state, given that the General Assembly is about to adopt a $3.4 billion budget that doesn't include an increase in the reimbursement rate for subsidized day care.
And two bills that would have addressed the problem will not even be brought to a vote before the Legislature adjourns Saturday.
Sen. Liane Sorenson, R-Hockessin, said she thinks the General Assembly should re-evaluate its priorities.
"I absolutely think it should have been a higher priority," Sorenson said. "A majority of our kids are in child care. If we can't subsidize at a full rate it makes it harder for our parents to find quality care."
Minner: 'We did the best we could'
Gov. Ruth Ann Minner defended the state's performance Thursday as she signed a bill making the Delaware Early Care and Education Council a permanent fixture in state government.
The budget she proposed in January includes some extra money to cover an expected increase in the number of children needing subsidized day care, but no increase in a reimbursement rate that provides between 57 cents to 75 cents for every dollar it costs providers.
Approximately 15,700 -- or about 30 percent of children up to age 12 in Delaware's early child care system -- qualify for state subsidies.
Minner said she would like to do more, but couldn't find the necessary money.
"We did the best we could to cover as much as we could and to help as many as we could," Minner said.
Legislators echo that sentiment, but their actions have not reflected claims that early childhood education is a priority.
Bills aimed at improving children's quality of life have made no headway. One bill would have raised child care subsidies, guaranteeing providers at least 75 percent of their costs. It would have added $9.4 million to the $3.4 billion state budget for the year that starts July 1.
Full text available at Delaware Online
|
WI - Proposal to cut $70 million in child care costs rejected
Submitted by kkurth. Posted on Tuesday, June 05 @ 15:36:30 EDT by kkurth
|
|
Wisconsin Gov. Jim Doyle's proposal to cut more than $70 million in the Wisconsin Shares program was turned down by the Joint Committee on Finance during a meeting covering the biennial budget bill on May 22.
The budget bill, as introduced, would have reduced the funding of the Wisconsin Shares program by $14 million in 2007-08 and $13 million in 2008-09 and would include provider payment rate freezes, family co-pay increases, family income eligibility cuts and waiting lists for children.
According to the Wisconsin Council on Children and Families (WCCF), as of February 2006, ��,688 families and 53,145 children were receiving child care subsidy help.”
“Wisconsin Shares has been hugely successful in enabling the parents of over 50,000 children each month to go to work this year,” said Charity Eleson, executive director of the WCCF.
Child care services have become extremely expensive with costs around $775 a month for full-time care for preschoolers and $1,000 a month for full-time infant-toddler care in major urban areas.
Even with the high costs, the WCCF has found that the spending amount for Wisconsin Shares has increased by 1 percent per child and has decreased by 10 percent when measured in real (inflation-adjusted) dollars.
Eleson said, Doyle tried to remedy part of the problem with a recommendation for additional funding for the program early in the budget process, but the proposal still contained policies that would substantially reduce the funding needed to meet the child care expenses of poor working families.
The Temporary Assistance for Needy Families (TANF) motion, offered by co-chairs Sen. Russell Decker, Rep. Kitty Rhoades, Sen. Robert Jauch and Rep. Jeff Stone, passed the Joint Committee on Finance on a 14-2 vote.
“We are very thankful for the commitment of the Joint Finance Committee co-chairs and the committee members for making Wisconsin Shares their top priority for low income working families,” Eleson said. “This is clearly a victory for working families that comes with a need for a recommitment on all sides to look for a successful future for TANF funded programs including Wisconsin Shares.”
Laura Pearson of the Kiddie Ranch Daycare and Learning Center in Beloit said the motion will help day cares a lot.
Full text available at the Beloit Daily News
|
AL - Lack of state funding could impact your kids
Submitted by kkurth. Posted on Thursday, May 24 @ 12:42:17 EDT by kkurth
|
|
Childcare providers across Alabama are making it known they're fed up. They want change in the state's subsidized child care plan. NBC 15's Andrea Ramey explains how a lack of funding could effect the kind of care provided for your child.
Naptime quickly follows lunch at the Quality Care Learning and Development Center. It's a licensed daycare which the state subsidies. That means the state partially pays for 75% of the childrens' fees.
"It's really kind of tough to keep it open," says the daycare center's director, Janice Hatcher. Tough because daycare providers across the state are being paid as low as $1.33 an hour to take care of children from low-income families. "It's kind of hard, kind of rough," says Hatcher.
Consequently, this center and others like it, struggle to pay for their much needed supplies and playground equipment.
The state requires a certain ratio of students per teacher. If the subsidy were increased, child care providers say they would be able to hire more teachers and take in more children.
"We have a lot of kids on the waiting list," says Hatcher. Many of them could ultimately wind up going to an unlicensed daycare facility because the licensed facilities can't afford to take-in anymore subsidized children.
"Unlicensed daycare is a very scary situation because you never know who you're dealing with," says Pay Guyton, Director of Mobile's Child Advocacy Center. Guyton says he's all too familiar with unlicensed facilities. "What we'll often get is reports of child abuse and neglect from these unlicensed daycares."
Full text availabe at NBC15online.com
|
CA - Affordable child care still a big challenge for many
Submitted by kkurth. Posted on Wednesday, May 23 @ 09:22:01 EDT by kkurth
|
|
Diyana Stringer has turned down two quality jobs in recent months in order to keep her family on a county waiting list for subsidized child care, a list she has failed to rise to the top of for more than two years, giving birth to a second child in the interim.
Stringer, her husband and two young daughters, like many Peninsula families, are caught in a bureaucratic cycle that prevents them from receiving a state-funded child care slot — in spite of qualifying under state law. The reason: Poorer families who have signed up more recently continually take priority, which is also part of the law, experts say.
Under the law, local families making 288 percent of the federal poverty level or less — roughly $13,200 a year — qualify for state-subsidized child care, but in practice, only a fraction of them actually receive slots due to lack of funding, said Nirmala Dillman, coordinator for the Child Care Partnership Council of San Mateo County, a group operated under the auspices of the county Office of Education.
More than $25 million a year in additional funding is needed in San Mateo County alone to close the child care gap and eliminate long waiting lists, Dillman said.
In fact, Stringer’s oldest daughter, now 3, is just one of more than 3,000 children ages 0 to 5 on a county waiting list for a slot in state-subsidized child care, according to a recent county report. The waiting list for kids from age 5 to 12 is at about 1,755, according to the report.
Local experts want more state funds to pay for local child care slots, Dillman said. Much of the funding would go to cities with the most need, including Daly City, East Palo Alto, Redwood City and South San Francisco, where the shortage of child care slots ranges from 250 to 500 slots for children ages 0 to 5, Dillman said.
“I’m not on welfare or food stamps. I just need a little [child care] help so that I can get a job,” said Stringer, a Belmont resident.
Full text available at the San Francisco Examiner
|
OR - Proposed budget axes child care for students' kids
Submitted by kkurth. Posted on Wednesday, May 16 @ 13:34:45 EDT by kkurth
|
|
Approximately 230 university students statewide could lose their means to pay for child care, should the currently proposed state co-chairs' budget be approved.
Oregon Student Child Care Program currently receives $1 million per year. That money assists low-income student parents with an identified need at Oregon's colleges and universities. Without that assistance, many students with children would be forced to drop out of school.
"For the families that receive it, it's go to school or not because of the high costs of child care," said Dennis Reynolds, EMU Child Care Center Coordinator. "It's vitally important for those people who need it."
The Governor's Recommended Budget originally proposed to maintain the program's funding but would switch which organization had authority over the funds. Then the co-chairs cut the program completely, eliminating the need for the transfer.
University student Natasha Owens' 6-year-old son Tyler is in kindergarten at Harris Elementary School. Tyler stays at the co-op while Owens is in class, but she said if the program is cut she won't be able to afford daycare.
Owens already faces the financial challenges college students handle every day, but with the added pressure of supporting another person, Owens finds it difficult to believe legislators would want to cut a program critical to the well-being of young families.
"My schooling is not just for me, it's for my kid also," Owens said. "Why would you not support the people that know where they're headed in life ... that have some direction and have others rely on them?"
An architecture major, Owens has found professors to be understanding thus far when she is forced to take Tyler to the studio, but she doesn't know how accommodating others will be if and when it becomes a regular occurrence.
But that may not even be a relevant question. Owens said if the program is cut, she will have to find a new way to support Tyler and herself or drop out of school.
Full text available at the Oregon Daily Emerald
|
NY - Organization to stop funding child care services for NY’s migrant farm work
Submitted by kkurth. Posted on Monday, May 07 @ 09:33:50 EDT by kkurth
|
|
The elimination of a subsidy program that has been used to fund childcare service providers statewide is expected to make the lives of struggling migrant farm workers with young children even more difficult.
Agri-Business Child Development, a nonprofit organization that provides early childhood education and social services to farm workers and eligible families in New York, is no longer subsidizing the Purchase of Service program that many agricultural families rely on for childcare.
Letters were sent to all 25 Purchase of Services providers statewide notifying them of the situation, said Susan Dingee, director of community relations at Agri-Business Child Development.
The April 16 letter from Maggie Evans, executive director of Agri-Business Child Development, indicates the program will be discontinued because of “serious fiscal constraints that [the] agency is facing.” According to the letter, the organization will honor its contract through May 31, at which time the program will no longer be subsidized.
Dingee said there have been difficulties funding the program since insurance costs when up following the events of Sept. 11, 2001. Also since that time, the cost of transportation has increased, and the impact of the minimum wage hike has added to operating costs. She said it has not helped that state funding for the program has remained stagnant and the federal aid Agri-Business receives has been cut by 1 percent.
Dingee said it was “heartbreaking” that they could not provide this service anymore and that it was a “last resort” to cut the program.
Emma Herzhauser, a teacher at Columbia Child Care Center in Columbia County, whose center received the letter from Agri-Business Child Development, said there are 57 children she knows of in her area who will be affected by this decision and additional families will probably be affected as more migrants come into New York state.
Herzhauser said the center was looking for alternative funding to help the migrant families.
Shelia Ramsey, assistant director of the Hudson Day Care Center, also in Columbia County, said her center was contacting the county Department of Social Services and hopes to receive “immediate assistance” for the families whose children are already enrolled at the daycare center.
Ramsey said her center was already “working to get the funding restored” for the agricultural families by calling local orchards in the area and trying to get Columbia County government involved.
Full text available at the Legislative Gazette
|
NY - State restores child care aid for working families
Submitted by kkurth. Posted on Thursday, May 03 @ 11:08:44 EDT by kkurth
|
|
About 100 working families in Broome County who lost their day care stipends more than a month ago because of state bureaucratic delays will be re-enrolled in day care beginning today, Broome County Department of Social Services Commissioner Arthur Johnson said.
Broome County received word late Wednesday afternoon that a $1.1 million shortfall in state day care money would be allocated to Broome, Johnson said. Johnson was forced to cut 100 working families from a program that gives working parents who qualify a stipend toward their day care costs after the state came up short in Broome's share of state day care funds.
Johnson said his office would begin contacting parents and day care providers today and begin re-enrolling the affected children in day care.
"This is a $1.1 million dollar win," Johnson said. "You don't get many of those."
Money for day care was restored in New York's budget, which was enacted April 1. But the state Office of Family and Children's Services had to reapportion day care aid to all of New York's counties, despite the pleas of Johnson and of state Assemblywoman Donna Lupardo, D-Endwell, to give Broome immediate word that it was approved to get the $1.1 million it lacked to pay for the day care program.
Families that were cut from their stipends April 1 were sent scrambling to find new day care for their children. One mother sent her son to live with his grandfather in Brooklyn so she could keep her job. Another lost her job. Some called on family members to help out, day care providers said.
Johnson had to cut working parents from the program because day care funding for people who are on welfare is mandated by the state and cannot be cut.
Full text available at the Press and Sun Bulletin
|
MD - Child care workers cry foul over pay
Submitted by kkurth. Posted on Wednesday, May 02 @ 10:06:22 EDT by kkurth
|
|
Day care workers rallied in front of state education headquarters in Baltimore Tuesday in hopes of getting money they say is owed to them for caring for children of low-income working families and families moving off of welfare.
The child care providers have been complaining of late and have missed payments for several months. They say that the state has done little to help them. They say that a telephone help line set up by the state has been useless and that they are falling behind on their bills.
State officials countered that payment problems -- caused in part by faulty computer software -- have been corrected, and that nearly 100 percent of invoices for the most recent pay period have been processed.
And while they admit that there is still a handful of providers who are missing money, they say they are working with those individuals to help them.
"Calls [for help] have decreased significantly," said Rolf Grafwallner, an assistant superintendent with the education department. "We had close to 600 to 700 calls in the first part of April, and now we are in the double digits. Most issues have been resolved."
Tuesday's rally, during which about 40 day care providers marched in a circle and shook soda cans filled with pennies, was sponsored by the Service Employees International Union, which is trying organize day care workers in Maryland.
State officials said they wondered why more workers weren't present if so many were, supposedly still without pay.
"We passed around a clipboard, and there were four people who wanted information," Grafwallner said. "We suspect this was a union action."
Sadie Robson Crabtree, a spokeswoman for the union, said that she faxed a list of 150 day care providers who are still missing payments to the education department Tuesday.
Crabtree said some providers didn't get a chance to sign because they were being ushered off state property by security guards when the list was being distributed.
Some who attended the rally spoke of a grim financial reality: They said they were owed thousands of dollars and were delinquent on mortgage payments and other bills. After the noon rally outside the education building, the group moved inside to the lobby and demanded to meet with State Superintendent of Schools Nancy S. Grasmick.
"Somebody is doing something with my money," said Catherine Waddell, 63, who cares for eight children at her home in Baltimore's Walbrook neighborhood.
Waddell said she is owed $2,674 and added that the state should do a better job taking care of low-income children. "Our kids deserve more than this," she said.
Waddell is among 7,500 day care providers statewide who care for children of low-income working families and families coming off welfare assistance.
The state pays day care providers to take care of the children so that parents -- who also pay a portion of the cost -- can keep their jobs and children can receive early education. An average of $10.2 million is paid to providers every six weeks, according to state officials.
After about 15 minutes of waiting, Grafwallner met with members of the group and reassured them that they would get their money.
"We take our responsibility seriously," Grafwallner said.
Full text available at the Baltimore Sun
|
Ohioans aren't cashing in on government money
Submitted by kkurth. Posted on Monday, April 30 @ 09:26:32 EDT by kkurth
|
|
Low- and moderate-income Ohioans are missing out on $1.5 billion in government benefits each year, turned off by exhaustive paperwork, confusing terminology or long lines.
State officials say many Ohioans could be eligible for thousands of dollars in additional income from tax refunds, home energy assistance, child-care subsidies and medical aid.
"We don't have to look very hard to see Ohioans who are struggling," said Gov. Ted Strickland, in Cleveland on Friday for the local start of the Benefit Bank, a free, Web-based program that helps people apply for a variety of assistance programs, file tax returns and register to vote.
The city was ranked as the nation's poorest big city by the U.S. Census Bureau last year for the second time in three years with nearly one in three of Cleveland's 452,200 residents living below the poverty line.
Counselors in the eight states and the District of Columbia where the Benefit Bank now operate have identified an average of $6,450 more in yearly benefits for each client.
Strickland estimates that 80 percent of the unclaimed benefits are from federal sources. Besides helping families, that money could boost the state's economy.
Ralph Gildehaus, director of the Ohio Benefit Bank, said many people do not know they qualify for help.
Lisa Hamler-Fugitt, executive director of the Ohio Association of Second Harvest Foodbanks, said about 500,000 Ohioans are eligible for the federal food stamp program, but aren't receiving the benefit.
The association of 12 food banks is working to implement Benefit Bank statewide. It already has linked people to more than $4.5 million in assistance, Gildehaus said.
"I think this is really going to be a great thing for the state of Ohio," said Anne Goodman, executive director of the Cleveland Foodbank.
Full text available at the BG News
|
CA - Parents seek state help with child care
Submitted by kkurth. Posted on Tuesday, April 24 @ 14:38:26 EDT by kkurth
|
|
REYNA BUSTOS has been on a waiting list since 2003 for a subsidy to offset the high cost of child care for her son, Elijah Lazo- Bustos. In 2003, Reyna Bustos asked for a little help from the state to subsidize the cost of child care for her 3-year-old son.
In the nearly four years that have passed, she has done nothing but wait.
"They just keep telling me that I'm not one of the most needy for day care," said Bustos, a 27-year-old South San Francisco resident. "And I only make $900 a month."
Last year, with her son set to "age out" of her local Early Head Start program, Bustos, a single mother, tried to find preschool care for her son. Most places, she said, wanted $800 to $1,000 a month. One, she recalled, wanted almost $650 a month forhalf a day.
In January, with still no subsidy from the state in sight, she quit her job at a day care center (whose employee discount of $500 a month she also could not afford) and took a part-time job as a student assistant in Skyline College's Admissions and Records office. Set to graduate next month from Skyline with her associate's degree in early childhood education, the move made her son, Elijah Lazo-Bustos, eligible for care at the college's Children's Center.
While her care at Skyline is free — and she is pleased with it — her only affordable option has boxed her into a part-time job outside her career field. Subsidies, she said, would give her options and room for advancement.
"I wouldn't be so limited," Bustos said. "I would be able to get a regular job."
In San Mateo County, Bustos is not alone in her hopes for some help to offset the costs of child care. As of Friday, there were 5,222 children in 4,046 families in the county on a waiting list — called the Central Eligibility List — for subsidies, said Claudia Alzugaray, program coordinator for the list at the Child Care Coordinating Council of San Mateo County. In the meantime, parents take sometimes drastic measures to get by — refusing raises to keep their income level low, leaving children unsupervised with older siblings, or wondering if they shouldn't just quit and stay home. Parents affected by the high cost of care — with the help of a project called Parent Voices — plan to make their plight known to the San Mateo County Board of Supervisors today and at the Capitol May 2. Parent Voices is a statewide grassroots project of the California Child Care Resource and Referral Network that involves parents in trying to improve child care access for all.
The problem, Alzugaray said, is simple: the approximately $10 million the state allots to the county for subsidies hasn't increased in years.
"There's a big discrepancy between the funding that we get and all the families that we serve," she said. "A lot of the families in there will probably never get served."
The subsidies, officially called the Alternative Payment Program, are provided by the Division of Child Development in the California Department of Education. Subsidies can be for as little as $500 to as much as $1,000 per month. Children from birth up to age 13 are eligible, and there are 44 programs in San Mateo County that will take children that receive them.
Families are pulled off the waiting list based on need, and Alzugaray sees parents nearly at the end of their rope as they've languished on it.
"We get a lot of families saying, 'I'm going to lose my job because I don't have a steady baby-sitter,'" Alzugaray said. "I'm sure a lot of people are leaving their kids at home with no supervision."
The desperate measures are a major worry for Linda Allen, the parent leader for the San Mateo chapter of Parent Voices.
"My greatest concern is that parents will take a risk that they normally would not take with their children, simply trying to get to work," Allen said.
Allen has fraternal twins who are now 11, but she relied on subsidies to help her afford before- and after-school care since they were 5.
The catch, she said, is that parents are often limited in the jobs they can take in order to put their children in affordable care, which simultaneously limits their chances to get ahead and someday afford care without help.
"The sad piece is that the families — whether a single mom or single dad — they really want to work," Allen said. "It's not that they're asking the state to take care of their children. They're asking them to help them while they're trying to take care of their families."
Full text available at Inside Bay Area
|
Result pages:
[1] 2 3 4 Next »
| |
|
Login
|
|
Don't have an account yet? You can create one. As a registered user you have some advantages like theme manager, comments configuration and post comments with your name.
|
|
|
|
