NH child care providers see new COVID relief package as critical

LACONIA — Child care providers, who are struggling to operate during the pandemic, got some hopeful news that they stand to receive additional federal assistance if Congress is able to pass another COVID relief bill.

In a teleconferenced roundtable meeting on Friday with heads  of organizations that offer child care services, U.S. Sen. Jeanne Shaheen said there is bipartisan agreement to provide $10 billion nationwide for child care in any COVID-19 economic relief package that Congress might pass in the coming weeks.

The senator said although that figure falls short of what child care providers need going forward, the amount is a step in the right direction.

“It’s not what we all want, but it will help as we go into the new year,” Shaheen said.

Since the coronavirus pandemic first hit the U.S., and in particular the Northeast, nine months ago child care providers have been facing rising costs, while at the same time they are serving fewer kids, and so they have less revenue coming in.

Chris Emond, executive director of the organization which oversees the Boys and Girls Clubs of the Lakes Region in Laconia, told Shaheen the coming months will be especially challenging.

He said the first six months of next year will be just as challenging as the past nine months have been.

He said the organization has difficulty hiring enough staff, largely because they are unable to offer the kind of pay that will attract qualified people to work with children.

“We are subsidizing child care services with the low wages of our staff,” said Christina D’Allesandro, state director of MomsRising, an organization concerned with economic issues affecting mothers and families, another roundtable participant.

Emond said the economic challenges facing families — and therefore child care service providers — will continue long after life gets back to normal after the pandemic.

“A year from now there will be struggles that will be continuing,” he said.

The point when life could return to the way it was before COVID would be when 75 to 80 percent of the population has taken the coronavirus vaccine, according to Dr. Anthony Fauci, the government’s top infectious disease expert, who has said the country could possibly be at that point next fall.

Shaheen agreed with Emond’s assessment and said the first half of 2021 could be just as hard on families economically as the past nine months.

Tracy Pond of Child Care Aware of New Hampshire, said that two-thirds of the child care centers are losing money by staying open.

Centers now can serve fewer youngsters at any one time in part because of state guidelines on social distancing. In addition some parents are hesitant to place their children in child care for fear they might contract the virus.

“The biggest issue is meeting payroll,” MaryLou Beaver, of the Children’s Place and Parent Education Center, in Concord, said.

While an agreement has been reached on the child care provision in the framework for a relief package, the bill has not been finalized. If Congress does pass the bill, and President Donald Trump signs it, the $10 billion that Shaheen’s COVID emergency relief framework contains for child care would be allocated to the states using the existing formula that is used for the Child Care and Development Block Grant program.

The National Women’s Law Center and the Center for Law and Social Policy found that it would take nearly $10 billion per month to keep the child care system afloat during the pandemic. Congress has already appropriated $3.5 billion for child care in the first CARES Act.