Coalition appeals to NY lawmakers for $1.5M in child care emergency funding - WCAX

PLATTSBURGH, N.Y. (WCAX) - Child care facilities in Clinton, Essex, and Franklin Counties are making a plea for more than $1.5 million in emergency funding from the state to help families in need.

“In Clinton, Essex, and Franklin Counties there are about 20,000 children,” said Sara Allen Taylor with the Child Care Coordinating Council of the North Country, a nonprofit that works to support families and caregivers in the region.

But she says there are only about 200 child care centers to handle that population. “There is almost 80% of kids here in the North Country region that cannot find a child care slot.”

Tayor says an average family with two kids spends roughly $15,000 a year on child care costs and a single child costs even more if it’s an infant. “That number can be almost $13,000 a year,” she said.

Those costs can put a dent in a working family’s budget if they are living paycheck to paycheck, which is fairly common with the regional median income for a family at $52,000.

“When you are dispersing $15,000 specifically for child care, you haven’t paid your housing, your food, your transportation, or anything else,” said Sylvie Nelson with the North Country Workforce Development Board.

After the pandemic hit, the board expected to see an increase in child care needs as unemployment numbers skyrocketed, but that wasn’t the case. Workers were not able to work because they were unable to find affordable child care options and their children were now required to do school at home, only adding to the burden. “So child care is a huge burden on family, and in turn that becomes a huge burden on the economy because people can’t afford to work,” Nelson said.

That’s why a coalition of child care centers and community leaders have banded together to show the need for more child care resources in the three-county region and are asking lawmakers for $1.5 million in emergency funding from this year’s budget to help subsidize child care for working families. In the long term, the group wants lawmakers to invest in higher pay and financial incentives so more child care centers will open, allowing families to work and not rely on neighbors and family to take care of their kids.

“We need dollars and we don’t need them in a year, we need them now because families are being affected, children are being affected,” Nelson said.

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Coalition appeals to NY lawmakers for $1.5M in child care emergency funding - WCAX
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