Governor Brown Proposes More Budget Cuts to Child Care

New Revenues Needed to Get Us Out of Vicious Cycle

Join our provider call to learn about budget proposal:
Tuesday, January 10th at 6:30 p.m.
Call info: 888-273-3658
Passcode: 9833263
Security code: 2012

On Thursday, January 5th Governor Brown announced his budget proposal for 2012, which includes a $518 million cut to California’s child care program. The governor’s announcement is only a proposal, but if he gets his way child care programs will be cut by 25% and our already broken system will lose 62,000 more slots — 17% of the slots that currently exist.

The biggest proposed cut, nearly $300 million, is to eliminate 46,000 child care slots. This proposal would require all single parents receiving child care subsidies to work the equivalent of 30 hours or more per week, or the work requirement standard that CalWORKs clients must meet.

“We all have to stand up and say this is not the kind of state we want to live in — a state that forces thousands of children into poverty, and pulls the rug out from under working families who rely on child care. There is extreme wealth in our state. There has to be a way to find more revenues to help provide the basic services we all need to survive.”
– Tonia McMillian, family child care provider, Bellflower

This requirement –not part of what the federal government requires– is in addition to income requirements that families currently meet.

Other areas proposed to be cut include:

• Reducing income eligibility for parents by $68 million, cutting nearly 16,000 slots. A family of 3 could now earn up to approximately $37,000 and remain eligible; current cap is above $42,000 for three-person family.
• Decreasing licensed provider rates by $17 million, ranging from no change to nearly $50 less per child per week.
• Decreasing center reimbursement rates by $102 million, reducing the standard reimbursement rate (SRR) by 10%.
• Additional $42 million in cuts.

Everyone should understand that what the governor announced is only a proposal. The only cuts that have been made so far are the Stage 3 reductions and the midyear trigger cuts that we were already aware of. But it’s certainly not good news; the economic reality in California is that we are bringing in less money in revenues than we’re spending on state services each year. This year the governor is projecting a $9.2 billion shortfall.

As child care providers we have more strength in numbers than we’ve had in the past, which means we have the ability to fight off some of the proposed cuts each year; we will get to work immediately to reduce the severity of these cuts of 25% of all child care funding. But there is no doubt we are also facing significant challenges in doing this each year. Until the revenue situation changes, we will continue to fight through cycles of proposed cuts to valuable programs each and every year.

Our child care provider unions, SEIU + AFSCME, have been at the forefront of organizations demanding that corporations, banks, and the richest people pay their fair share to making our society work the way it should. We can’t restore our economy by letting corporations and the wealthy off the hook, pocketing record profits, while working families lose any opportunity to move to self-sufficiency.

This year, our child care union will be working to pass through a revenue initiative in California that will secure more money for education in California. Having significantly more money in the state budget will ultimately help services across the board.

We will send out more information in the future about both the proposed budget cuts and the revenue solutions our union is promoting. In the meantime, to learn more details about the Governor’s proposed cuts to child care and other services, please visit http://www.ebudget.ca.gov/