POUGHKEEPSIE- Alex Smith is a mother of two children under the age of 3, who has found it virtually impossible to find daycare in the Town of Northeast where she lives.
On Friday, at the DAY ONE Learning Community in Poughkeepsie, she shared her frustrating childcare saga during a roundtable discussion that included educators, childcare providers, parents, stakeholders and Congressman Pat Ryan (D-18), who later toured the facility.
Smith described in detail the never-ending challenge for families like hers, who live in the Eastern Dutchess County Corridor.
“We have no childcare,” said Smith. “Our only daycare center closed when my son was just 18-months-old. Families in our area travel at least 30 minutes to daycare providers in Connecticut and then join a waiting list.”
Smith, who works full time as a manager at the Poughkeepsie Children’s Cabinet, says she had no choice but to hire a nanny to take care of her infant daughter.
Her story is one of many.
Laura Elnaccash is a stay-at-home mom from Hyde Park, whose three-year-old son, Khalil, received personalized attention at DAY ONE for his hearing impairment and speech delay.
“We couldn’t afford to have him here every day,” said Elnaccash. “The summer is such a struggle. All the camps cost so much money, and childcare is so outrageously expensive, I don’t know how people do it.”
Participants from a variety of childcare-related entities from both sides of the river spoke of the most pressing problems affecting their ability to provide quality childcare for families in the region.
The sheer lack of childcare providers, the cost for families and the cost for childcare business-owners topped the list. They cited the lack of transportation and, specifically, the number of childcare slots available for infants as two other serious obstacles.
The group presented Congressman Ryan with statistics based on birth rate projections. They show that over 10-thousand slots would be needed to provide children from ages 0-3 in Dutchess County with childcare. Those slots would require a staff of over 2-thousand individual care givers.
Earlier this year, Governor Hochul launched her plan to deliver universal childcare for all New York children under age 5 and partnered with three counties, including the DAY ONE Pilot Program in Dutchess, to help them offer additional childcare options in their communities.
“Governor Hochul has been doing an amazing job to open eligibility, to fund slots and to create equitable access to quality care,” said Heidi Brandt, owner of Heidi’s House Daycare in Saugerties and a childcare provider for 36 years. “Unfortunately, the federal government has not had that same trajectory. The children and families of New York and across the nation are struggling, and our daycares are still closing at alarming rates.”
Providers expressed concerns about the future of federal funding to (CCAP) the Child Care Assistance Program, which makes childcare possible for many families, who need to enter the workforce.
“They’ve cut healthcare, food assistance, childcare and all at the same time that they’re spending over a billion dollars a day in a war and giving tax breaks to the top one percent. That’s just so wrong and so un-American, so we’re looking to turn that around,” said Congressman Ryan. “I want to make sure that in addition to the issue of housing, healthcare, utilities and transportation, that we’re paying attention to the issue of childcare. I think we’re going in the right direction.”
Dr. Julie Riess, Co-Founder and Chief Early Education officer at DAY ONE, believes that educating children from 0-5 years should eventually become a consistent, reliable part of our country’s educational system.
“Public education in our country has been around for a hundred years,” said Riess. “And yet we still do nothing to make early childhood education part of that system. We know that brain development is key between 0 and 3 years. We need to be thinking about this as an investment in our future.”
“The idea that school starts at age five is a bit ridiculous to me,” said Beau Morimadno, who’s two children attend DAY ONE. “Education should start as soon as a child is born. It’s the responsibility for institutions to pick up the burden from families and help educate those children affordably or for free.”
Comments