States Should Act Now to Invest in Children

One of the guidelines I’ve read about blogging is that you shouldn’t start a blog unless you have something that interests you so much that you will be able to write about it at least once a week. Hmmm. I seem to have fallen behind, and I apologize. But I assure you that my absence wasn’t due to lack of interest, but to a paralysis of indecision regarding where to start (ok, that and school vacation – all you parents out there will understand). Actually, the situation is that there are so many ideas to act upon that I’m not sure where to start.

Kind of like states implementing the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act (also known as the stimulus package).

I just got off a timely conference call hosted by Danielle Ewen at the Center on Law and Social Policy and Helen Blank at the National Women’s Law Center. Here’s the gist. There is money available to states to do important work in the area of child care and early childhood education, that will create and preserve jobs and help families get through this economic crisis. Funding will come through increases in the Child Care and Development Block Grant, Head Start, and Title I. A state by state breakdown of dollars is available from the National Education Association here. States have a lot of flexibility in how to use the new funds, but they have to act now.

With $2 billion new dollars in federal child care funding, $1.1 billion in Early Head Start, $1 billion in Head Start, and $10 billion in Title I, there is clearly an opportunity to strengthen child care and early childhood education services at the state and local levels, which will create and preserve jobs (think teachers, trainers, quality specialists) and help parents stay in their jobs by making child care more affordable. You can track how states are using federal recovery dollars here.

It’s important for state and local administrators not to fall prey to the paralysis of indecision, but to act quickly to turn that money around and invest it in children, families, and communities. It’s important to get these investments right, and they will be held accountable by the feds for the numbers of jobs created and saved. But we have children on the waitlist for child care subsidies today. And programs closing classrooms and laying off teachers because parents can’t afford to send their children. States should not wait until they have the perfect plan to act. As President Obama said in his address last night, “the cost of inaction will be far greater.”