Op-ed drafted for California child care advocate in anticipation of the state legislature's 2019 budget vote in June 2019.

1. When a state breaks a child care system, it has to fix it
For the last three years, I have worked to help parents find child care they can afford in the mess that is
California’s child care system.
The irony is that I can’t find child care I can afford for my own children. My husband and I work different
shifts to manage care for our two children.
We’re not alone.
At my job, I hear every day how parents in Sonoma County make hard financial choices and sacrifices to
make ends meet and care for their children. Some can afford full-time child care because they live in
less-expensive, but also less safe neighborhoods. Others turn down jobs that would improve their
families’ financial outlook or delay a return to school because it would increase their child care cost.
California’s child care system has been in a race to the bottom since the Great Recession a decade ago
when early learning programs lost ​$1 billion​ ​in state funding. The cuts were so deep and harsh that
parents at almost every income level felt the effect of the system’s deterioration, with most still
struggling to find affordable, high-quality care.
Thankfully, the recommendations this spring from the final report by the ​State Assembly’s Blue Ribbon
Commission on Early Childhood Education​ resonated enough in Sacramento to change the outlook for
California parents who are seeking relief this year.
Governor Newsom revised his budget request last month, and in it, he allocates $12.8 million to create a
pilot program that provides emergency child care funding for financially strapped families who would
not qualify for child care assistance, and he adds $80 million in funding to support other early learning
programs.
It is fantastic news that ​families may soon have more access to affordable, high-quality care. But there is
a lot of lost ground to make up.
Today, parents often go without child care services because they were not told they still qualify for
assistance up to 24 months after exiting the CalWORKs program. Other parents who are eligible for child
care subsidies are forced to navigate a maze of regulations and deal with funding that differs from
county to county, making it next to impossible for families to move within the state for a new job or get
a pay raise and keep child care.
I know this story well because a minuscule pay raise of $2 per hour–$1 for me, the other $1 for my
husband–made the child care subsidy my family qualifies for out of financial reach.

2. Where we live in the Bay area is so expensive that a family of five can earn $88,000 per year and be
eligible to receive child care assistance. However, at that threshold, it costs $632 a month to receive the
subsidy. After paying rent, buying food, making student loan payments, managing health care costs, and
meeting other household expenses, affording that monthly cost becomes impossible.
To put this all in perspective, money was so tight for my family that just five days after a recent payday
and after paying rent, buying food, car insurance payments and other family bills, my husband and I had
to stretch $50 for ten days and purchase gas for both cars at $4 per gallon.
Since moving back to my native California in 2015, we have both had to work to afford the Bay area’s
super expensive housing costs along with other expenses, and with the child care subsidy’s copay too
costly for us to afford, we are forced to arrange our work schedule around child care.
After my husband leaves his overnight job shift as a ​casino table accountant, he drives 20 miles to get
home and ​sleep for a few hours before getting up just after dawn to care for our toddler. I take our
4-year-old to part-time preschool each morning and bring him home midday for lunch. His dad looks
after him and his brother until I return home at the end of my workday. Once I’m back, my husband and
I switch places. Neither one of us gets much rest; I pray that as my husband leaves for work each day, he
doesn’t get pulled over again by police for swerving because of fatigue.
We feel stuck, and based on what I hear from parents each day, they feel stuck too.
California lawmakers have an opportunity this month to approve the state budget presented by
Governor Newsom and begin the process of putting our state back on the road to having a
well-functioning child care system.
I hope the legislators take advantage of our booming economy to make some permanent changes to
child care now, building in safeguards like emergency child care assistance that will protect families
during times of economic stress. And in addition to fighting for more investments in our state, we need a
bold federal solution to our nation’s child care crisis.
California has the ​fifth largest ​economy in the world and has more than recovered from the last
recession. Every family in the state deserves the right to thrive.
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