These cities raised taxes – for child care. Parents say free daycare ‘changed my life’

NEW ORLEANS — Last summer, Derrika Richard felt trapped. She didn’t have enough money to pay for child care for her three youngest children, ages 1, 2 and 3. However, the demands of caring for them daily made working for Richard, a hairdresser, impossible. A child care program rejected her because she didn’t work enough. It seemed like an insoluble dilemma: without care, she wouldn’t be able to work. And without work, she couldn’t pay for care.

But Richard’s life changed in the fall when, thanks to a new city-funded program for low-income families called City Seats, she enrolled her three children at Clara’s Little Lambs, a daycare in New Orleans’ Westbank neighborhood. For the first time, she is earning enough to pay her bills and pay for online classes.

“It actually paved the way for me to go to school,” Richard said one morning this spring, after escorting the three children to their classrooms. City Seats, she said, “changed my life.”

___

This series about 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 The Hechinger Report, AL.com, The Associated Press, The Christian Science Monitor , The Dallas Morning News, Idaho Education News, The Post & Mail and The Seattle Times.

___

Last year, New Orleans added more than 1,000 child care spaces for low-income families after voters approved a historic property tax increase in 2022. The referendum increased the program’s budget sevenfold — from $3 million to US$21 million per year for 20 years. years. Because Louisiana’s Early Childhood Fund matches money raised locally for child care, the city receives an additional $21 million to help families find care.

New Orleans is part of a growing trend of communities passing ballot measures to expand access to child care. In Whatcom County, Washington, a property tax increase added $10 million for child care and children’s mental health to the county’s annual budget. A marijuana sales tax approved last year by voters in Anchorage, Alaska, will generate more than $5 million for early childhood programs.

The state of Texas took a slightly different approach. In November, voters approved a state constitutional amendment that allows tax benefits for qualified child care providers. Under this provision, cities and counties may choose to exempt a day care center from paying all or some of its property taxes. Dallas was one of the first cities and counties in Texas to offer tax incentives.

Recent local initiatives focus on younger children — babies and toddlers — more than ever, said Diane Girouard, senior state policy analyst at Child Care Aware, a nonprofit research and advocacy group.

“In the past, we have seen more local or state initiatives focused on preschool, but in the last three years, we have seen voters approve ballot measures to invest in child care and early learning,” she said.

One reason: People have seen the economic impact of a lack of child care during the pandemic, said Olivia Allen, co-founder of the nonprofit Children’s Funding Project.

“The value of child care and other parts of the care economy has become abundantly clear to many business leaders in a painful way,” Allen said.

For some Americans, the child care crisis has continued, preventing them from holding down jobs and advancing their careers. The number of parents reporting missing work because of child care increased in 2020 at the start of the COVID-19 outbreak; has not yet returned to pre-pandemic levels. In Louisiana, 27% of families with children under age 5 reported a disruption in child care in February or March, according to Census Household Pulse Survey data analyzed by The Associated Press in partnership with the Education Reporting Collaborative.

In New Orleans, a city with many workers in the service industry and other low-wage jobs, funding from city councils has been transformative for parents struggling to hold down demanding, mostly non-union jobs. The program has also been a boon for the daycare centers themselves.

Richard has continually struggled to find affordable child care since dropping out of college when he gave birth to his oldest son, now 12. This is despite the fact that she immediately put her name forward for daycare when she found out she was pregnant. “Literally, when you see the ‘positive’ line, you fill out a form,” she said of taking a pregnancy test.

Now that she can think about building a career again, Richard is determined to finish her university degree. Her dream is to pursue a career in the forensic field.

Another father, Mike Gavion, who has two children enrolled at Early Partners in the Garden District, said City Seats allowed his wife to finish school and get a nursing job. Before the program was available, Gavion’s wife had to care for their children, now ages 2 and 4, and was only able to progress slowly through the courses needed to qualify for a job.

“It really gave us an opportunity,” Gavion said. “If we had to pay for two children, I don’t think she would be able to afford nursing.”

Families in New Orleans qualify for City Seats if they have children from birth to age 3 and earn 200% of the federal poverty level. But many don’t get a spot right away: In April, City Seats had 821 students on its waiting list, according to Agenda for Children, the nonprofit that runs the program.

About 70% of City Seats’ budget pays for children to attend centers rated as high quality in the state’s rating system. The rest of the budget goes toward improving quality: child care providers have access to a team that includes a speech therapist, pediatrician, and social worker.

Participating providers are required to pay their employees at least $15 per hour – on average, Louisiana child care providers earned $9.77 per hour in 2020 – and adhere to strict teacher-child ratios and class sizes. They also receive professional development from early learning experts.

City Seats funding has allowed Wilcox Academy’s three centers in the city’s North Broad, Central City and Uptown neighborhoods to increase average employee pay to $18 per hour. The Academy’s goal is to increase it even further – to $25 per hour.

“Teachers deserve it,” said Rochelle Wilcox, founder and director of the Academy. “They deserve to go on vacation, they deserve to buy a house, they deserve to buy a car. … This is not a luxury.”
___

Valeria Olivares of The Dallas Morning News and Sharon Lurye of The Associated Press contributed reporting. ___

Associated Press education coverage receives financial support from several private foundations. AP is solely responsible for all content. Find AP’s standards for working with philanthropies, a list of supporters, and funded coverage areas at AP.org.