Measuring the toll of a broken child care system - Crosscut

Employers search for ways to help

The medical center in Elma and a state prison in Aberdeen, two of the largest employers in Grays Harbor County, are particularly hard hit by inadequate child care services, because so many of their staff members must do their work in person, rather than remotely. 

At Aberdeen’s Stafford Creek Corrections Center, human resources consultant Rhonda Schwerdel said the high costs and low availability of child care have hurt recruitment and retention at the 500-employee facility. 

This is especially true for “custody” staff. Guards and workers with similar responsibilities can’t take advantage of flexible work schedules or teleworking. Nor can they bring their babies to work. Custody jobs run on three shifts, 24 hours, every day, so those workers need child care at all hours of the day, on weekends and holidays. Schwerdel said couples who both work at the prison will choose not to work the same shift in order to get around the lack of available child care. And many Stafford Creek workers, including Schwerdel, rely on family, friends and neighbors to fill in gaps in care.

The prison must keep a certain number of custody staff on each shift to provide security and supervision. If a staff shortage develops at any point, managers call on employees to work mandatory overtime, a process governed by a collective bargaining agreement. 

Not surprisingly, that wreaks havoc on carefully cobbled-together child care plans. And it can take physical and mental tolls on staff already working in a stressful environment. 

Summit Pacific Medical Center’s Martin sees child care as an economic driver. The hospital plans to expand its services, and thus its staff, by at least 30% in the coming years, he said, making it critically important to increase child care capacity in the county. 

The hospital already provides a flexible spending account for child care, and administrators work with staff whenever possible to restructure shifts or allow remote options. But that’s feasible for only a small number of its 375 employees. 

“Summit Pacific has lost employees due to a lack of child care and has even had candidates turn down job offers” for the same reason, Martin said. 

The challenge for hospitals is especially acute in rural communities. Like child care centers, hospitals have patient-to-staff ratios to ensure safety and quality care. When there are not enough staff or beds to care for patients, the hospitals go on “divert” status, sending ambulances elsewhere. That means patients who need critical care must wait longer and end up farther from loved ones. It also means that, for the length of the ride to and from a more distant hospital, an ambulance is unavailable to answer calls back in Elma.

Martin said an employee survey conducted several years ago demonstrated the need for child care closer to Elma. So the hospital lobbied and collaborated with local partners to bring in a new child care business across the street, with capacity for about 120 kids on a full-time basis. With land and site preparation donated by a church, a grant from the state and a private loan, Learning to Grow hopes to open the site in the fall of 2022. 

Employers have a range of tools to help workers with child care needs, from flexible scheduling to spending accounts that allow employees to set aside pretax dollars for child care. Flexible scheduling is one of the easiest solutions for some worksites and some jobs. In fact, nearly half of the surveyed employers in Grays Harbor and nearby counties do this. 

Company and state policies on paid leave can help, especially with newborns. Schwerdel said 12 weeks of paid family and medical leave has been a big help to the prison staff. She sees families with the new mom taking 12 weeks first, then the dad taking 12 weeks. That gets them through nearly the first six months of a new baby’s life, with time to both bond and establish a child care routine. 

Companies as diverse as local fast-food chain Dick’s Drive-In and Facebook offer employees financial assistance to directly pay for child care. But parents cannot pay for something that doesn’t exist. 

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