CHILD CARE FUNDING IN COLORADO: A LOOMING CRISIS
There is a significant funding shortage for early childhood programs across Colorado. Most childcare programs, including ours, participate in a program called the Child Care Assistance Program (CCAP). This program provides tuition directly to programs for families who meet one of the following criteria: they are foster parents, they are low or no income and in school full time, they are low income but working. The program is designed to provide stability for young children while their parents work to improve their family’s circumstances.
As Westwood Academy is located in the lowest income area in Denver, our business model was designed to serve families through CCAP. We have been a go-to program for county social services seeking emergency placements for families in crisis. Originally, about 2/3 of our enrollment were families using CCAP to cover tuition. That has dropped to less than half.
CCAP funding is distributed through the counties. We have fiscal agreements with four counties. One by one, over the past few months, each county has announced a temporary freeze on CCAP funds. Originally, we expected the freeze to be a few months at most. Unfortunately, in the past two weeks, the people at the Early Childhood Education Association of Colorado and in the early childhood councils have started saying that they expect this funding freeze to last 3-5 years.
CCAP is primarily funded through a federal block grant called the Child Care Development Block Grant (CCDBG). That means we rely on congress and the president to authorize this funding in the federal budget. Considering the current actions in the administration regarding federal grants, including an attempt to freeze funding for all Head Start programs, we have to assume that this funding is unlikely to be reauthorized.
What does this mean for families in Colorado? This means that lower income families with young children and families who take in foster children are losing access to an essential mechanism to help them provide healthy, stable lives for their families. We are already seeing some of these families quit their jobs and go on Temporary Assistance for Needy Families (TANF) since they can’t work and care for their children at the same time.
We will see fewer families able to take on foster children and provide them with stable homes. I also anticipate we will see increases in unemployment for families with young children paired with increases in need for programs such as TANF.
What does this mean for Westwood Academy? We had three families lined up to join our program that are no longer able to because their CCAP authorizations are not going to go through. Because we are small, that’s a huge financial hardship for our program. I am pivoting our marketing and enrollment strategy to primarily serving families who can pay full tuition. While this will help keep the program operating and the staff paid, it will significantly decrease the diversity of the students in the program, which is a loss for all of us.
I am also setting up a small handful of scholarship spaces to help replace the loss of CCAP spots. These spaces will be offered at a 50% discount on extended day tuition to families who make an annual household income of less than $75,000 per year. They will be required to submit tax returns and paystubs as proof. This will be made available to newly enrolling families and families who are dropped from CCAP.
Why is there a funding gap when voters just authorized Universal Pre-K (UPK)? Because the childcare industry is overseen by the Department of Early Childhood and UPK is funded through the Department of Education. UPK funding primarily goes to public schools. It also only covers 10-15 hours per week and only for 4-year-olds. CCAP funding is distributed by the state to the counties and the counties allocate the funding to families. They have entirely separate funding streams and oversight mechanisms.
What can you do? Go to https://justfacts.votesmart.org/ and enter your address. This will tell you who represents you at every level of government. Contact your representatives at the state level and tell them to prioritize funding for CCAP programs. If you are a CCAP family, tell them how the program has impacted you and your children. Contact your representatives at the federal level and tell them to reauthorize funding for the Child Care Development Block Grant and protect early childhood funding in the budget. This is especially important to do if you have a Republican representative, as they have the power in congress.
CCAP families: DO NOT MOVE COUNTIES! We have learned that many counties are not allowing transfers from other counties. That means that, if you move from Denver County to Jefferson County, you will lose your CCAP. If at all possible, stay put. Also, be diligent about completing our CCAP re-authorizations at least 60 days in advance of your expiration date. Finally, PLEASE be sure to check your children in and out on the tablet every day. If you miss a check in or check out, we don’t get paid for your child attending.
The other thing you can do is refer our program to your friends and family. Send them a link to our website: https://www.westwood-academy.com/ You can also write us a positive review on Google or Care.com, both help us get seen by more people.
You can learn more about the CCAP freeze here: https://coloradosun.com/2025/01/21/child-care-assistance-freeze/
