Fiscal Note
There is currently $965,000 available in Contingent Reserve. No impact on the tax levy or cost controls.
Title
Amending the 2007 Operating Budget to appropriate $20,000 from Contingent Reserve and authorizing the expenditure of an additonal $20,000 in Child Care Stabilization Funds through the City Child Care Assistance Program.
Body
Background
The 2000 budget provided $20,000 within the child care assistance budget for a Child Care Stabilization fund to assist City of Madison accredited child care programs serving low-income children. The funding was intended to stabilize care for low-income families for the following reasons:
1) Low-income families more often lose their jobs and in turn lose their child care subsidies, leaving centers with unpaid bills.
2) Low-income families on state assistance are often unable to pay their assigned co-payments under the state system, and therefore fall behind, leaving the center with bad debt.
3) Staff turnover in centers serving low-income children is higher due to lower wages.
4) The more low-income children the center serves, the less financially stable the center is.
When centers serving low-income children close, they are not replaced, because it is not financially feasible. This fund was designed to provide timely help to prevent the closing of badly needed services for children and families, and to provide for help that families are ineligible for assistance from the State.
From 2000 to the early part of 2006, the state child care assistance program (Wisconsin Shares) remained fairly stable. While centers continued to experience difficulty with bad debt, City of Madison Stabilization funds allowed centers in 2006 to keep 247 families in care that would otherwise have been disenrolled due to bad debt.
In 2006 and 2007, the state has taken actions that further jeopardize the ability of centers to serve children on subsidies and survive financially. Among those actions ar...
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