How the Trump administration’s freeze on child care funding will affect families : NPR

TO MARTÍNEZ, HOST:

Child care providers across the United States say the administration’s decision to freeze federal funding for child care will be disruptive for children, parents, providers and businesses whose employees cannot work without child care. Now, to learn more about the challenges providers face, we called Cindy Lehnhoff. She is the director of the National Child Care Association. Cindy, so after this week’s announcement from the Trump administration, what are providers telling you?

CINDY LEHNHOFF: Well, providers are extremely concerned, as they should be, that they won’t be able to stay open if there are delays in receiving their subsidized payments for the children in their care who fall under CCFD funding. And this will not only affect the 1.4 million children in subsidized child care, but it is also very common for centers to cater to subsidized child care and working parents who pay for care. So if the centers…

MARTÍNEZ: Yeah.

LEHNHOFF: … Are closed, you’re going to affect millions of children and families who rely on this essential service for work.

MARTÍNEZ: Is it fair to say that there could be a domino effect? So if there is no open center to care for children, working parents may have to stay home after work. And then – I mean, and – you know what I mean? For example, a domino effect from there could be disastrous.

LEHNHOFF: Oh, absolutely. We’ve already seen that, you know, the entire workforce in the United States is demanding more accessible and more affordable child care because they need employees. So we already have a labor shortage in the United States. And that’s just going to make it worse and take it to a level that I think a lot of people, especially policymakers, are really overlooking and not anticipating.

MARTÍNEZ: The funding that has been frozen – how is it used, generally, by child care providers?

LEHNHOFF: Well, it goes towards paying the rent. That’s – 70% of that goes to paying their employees. It is a labor-intensive industry due to the low child-teacher ratio needed to keep children safe when in care and in healthy environments. So that’s going to prevent them from, you know, paying their expenses. They are small businesses. Ninety percent of the child care infrastructure in the United States is made up of small businesses, and they essentially live paycheck to paycheck.

MARTÍNEZ: So I was going to ask you, so – yeah. How long could they go without this funding? I mean, how long could they stay open, or have you heard of immediate closure?

LEHNHOFF: Well, we’re already facing shutdowns because of things that are already happening. I mean, I’m sure you’ve probably heard the term child care crisis. Parents pay more than the rent, you know, for child care. And we face labor shortages in child care because we cannot compete with the salaries paid to early childhood educators and child care professionals in public schools and other service sectors. So, you know, it just compounds what’s already there…

MARTÍNEZ: Yeah.

LEHNHOFF: …One problem, and they won’t be able to survive. Most of them will not survive more than a month.

MARTÍNEZ: Okay.

LEHNHOFF: And even then, you know, missing a paycheck will be…

MARTÍNEZ: That’s true. Yeah.

LEHNHOFF: …Take them out.

MARTÍNEZ: To your knowledge, Cindy, has the Trump administration given states any specific guidance on what they need to do to reactivate funding?

LEHNHOFF: Well, no. And, you know, that’s a concern. This announcement was made on Wednesday. And the government agencies HHS and ACF, the Administration for Children and Family Services, you know, are closed until Monday. Providers and families are therefore left without adequate information about what will actually happen. And I just really want to emphasize the fact that accountability is key. But it comes – it must be accompanied by a clear and actionable federal plan that does not punish legitimate providers for the failure of the federal and state governments to provide necessary oversight. And withholding funds from compliant suppliers won’t solve fraud. This will destabilize an already fragile system.

MARTÍNEZ: Cindy Lehnhoff is director of the National Child Care Association. Cindy, thank you for sharing your thoughts on this.

LEHNHOFF: Thank you.

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