House hears two sides to the child care workforce funding argument

Children play at The Growing Years Early Childhood Center in Manchester. (Photo by Maya Mitchell/New Hampshire Bulletin)

Over the past week, the House Finance Committee heard two opposing arguments regarding funding for child care workforce recruitment and retention efforts. 

New Hampshire’s biennial budget trailer bill, House Bill 2, allocates $7.5 million a year to aid efforts to strengthen the child care workforce. Early education in the Granite State is facing several challenges, including high turnover and limited program capacity for children. The funding program, which started in 2023 to help employers address those issues, was included in HB 2.

Legislators sought to fund the program with federal Temporary Assistance for Needy Families, or TANF, funds. This approach has created problems, as the federal government’s response and the state’s interpretation have repeatedly been questioned by lawmakers. 

The two bills have opposite aims: House Bill 1566 proposes that state general funds will be used for the $15 million appropriation if the federal government gives a definitive no to using TANF funds or never clarifies. House Bill 1515 proposes removing the allocation from HB 2 altogether. 

The hearing on HB 1515 was held on Friday, and both lawmakers and lobbyists in attendance described it as “very confusing.” 

Rep. Len Turcotte of Barrington, the bill’s sponsor, testified to the committee about “the fiscal insanity” of how much money the state spends on the Child Care Scholarship Program and the new presumptive eligibility program. At one point in the hearing, Turcotte said that the bill would “repeal the expansion” of the child care scholarship program. Later on, he said it would “pull back the expansion of the policy issues and what would have been the $7.5 million per year.” 

The bill’s methodology states that it would repeal the section of HB 2 “that appropriated $7.5 million in each year of the FY26/27 biennium to the Department of Health and Human Services for the purpose of providing grants to NH childcare providers for employee recruitment and retention.”  

More than one committee member questioned Turcotte on the bill’s intended purpose.

Rep. Laura Telerski, a Nashua Democrat and deputy House minority leader, asked Turcotte to clarify if his bill would target the scholarship program or if it would target one of the provisions of the workforce fund, which would allow employees to get assistance on child care for their own children. 

Turcotte said that was “one interpretation,” that he “didn’t read it that way,” and that he thought he was stopping the expansion of the scholarship fund. 

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HB 2 states that program grants may be used for sign-on or retention incentives, wage increases, child care tuition assistance or discounts, costs of professional training, paid time off equivalent, telemedicine coverage, and more. 

Turcotte said the committee should recommend that his bill pass because the federal government already “negated” that TANF dollars could be used, something that has been debated heavily in both chambers of the Legislature.

During the executive session for Senate Bill 483 last month, the companion bill to HB 1566, the Senate Finance Committee pushed the Department of Health and Human Services to get clarification from the federal government.

Karen Hebert, director of the Division of Economic Stability, revealed the answer on Monday during the hearing for HB 1566.

Hebert said the Administration for Children and Families “reconfirmed to the department that TANF can be used only to benefit TANF eligible families and children” on Jan. 20 and that “TANF cannot be used to support operating expenses of a business or industry who is not eligible for TANF.” 

“The federal government’s response, essentially, is that it doesn’t see how [TANF] can be used to pay for child care workers directly,” Hebert said. 

Rep. Mary Jane Wallner of Concord, HB 1566’s prime sponsor and member of the Finance Committee, argued funding the child care workforce program would be similar to state funding for recruitment efforts and sign-on bonuses for nurses, health care workers, and state prison guards over the past several years. 

“All over the state, there are child care facilities with classrooms sitting empty because of the lack of staff,” she said. “HB 1566 is the best tool we have to recruit and retain valuable child care providers.” 

Wallner also testified that, because her bill would continue to fund the workforce program that started in 2023, the Department of Health and Human Services had already developed the program, application procedures, and measures to ensure it met its standards. 

As with SB 483, over a dozen child care providers, program directors, and advocates lined the halls of Granite Place in Concord, where committee meetings are being held, in a show of support for the bill before the hearing for HB 1566. Since the federal government provided a clear follow-up response on whether TANF funds could be used, they said they believe there is hope for the program’s future funding. 

A work session for both bills is scheduled for Monday, Feb. 9, at 10 a.m before the House Finance Committee, Division III.