Rachel Ravina, The Reporter
NORRISTOWN — More than 30 advocates, elected officials and child care providers gathered recently to discuss the state of child care in Montgomery County.
There are 450 providers in Montgomery County offering a myriad of services to educate and care for children, according to a spokesperson for the education advocacy group Children First.
Participants of the “Recovering from the Pandemic: The Role of Child Care” roundtable inside the Willow School, an early childhood education center in Norristown, shared how the COVID-19 pandemic focused a light on the need for services and the struggles that child care centers still face.
“It is a crisis,” said Willow School owner Kym Ramsey, adding that “we need your support to help move us through this, for not only business owners, but for our community and other businesses who depend on us to be open so they can work.”
Ramsey, a child care professional with more than 20 years of experience, sought to impress upon elected officials and attendees that child care “provide(s) a social service for our community,” but the facilities are “businesses.”
Child care offers a myriad of early learning resources that range from academic to social-emotional tools for children from birth to 8 years old, according to Gwynedd Mercy University.
Addressing the reality of these shortages was top of mind for facility proprietors and advocates alike.
“We still have a staffing crisis that’s going on, and I know that that’s across the board in all different sectors, but child care is really what’s driving our economy and making sure that parents can get to work,” said Mai Miksic, early childhood education policy director for Children First. “So until we can really think about how to solve this crisis we’re not going to be able to fully recover from the pandemic.
Participants estimated that child care center employees make between $10 and $12 per hour, which elected officials and advocates pointed out pales in comparison to jobs in the retail and food service sectors including Amazon, Chick-fil-A, Target, and Wawa.
Amazon reportedly pays workers an average of $18 per hour. Target set a $15 per hour minimum wage back in 2020 and now offers up to $24 per hour for some employees.
Miksic noted that other benefits such as health care and a 401K will often accompany these positions. “I think it’s time we really start thinking about how we give the salaries that are needed to sustain the sector,” Miksic said.
Figures from a September Children First report on the pandemic’s impact on children revealed that “child care wages trail (the) retail industry by $200 per week,” according to statistics cited from the U.S. Department of Labor.
“We cannot compete with other industries at all. We cannot offer the wages and the benefits,” said Courtney Kimmel, owner of Li’l Tykes Childcare & Learning Center, located in Springfield, Delaware County.
But demand continues, and Miksic pointed out that “we still have long wait lists for children to get into child care programs.”
Kimmel said that 200 children are on a waitlist for her Delaware County child care center.
“We’re not sure where those children are going and that’s scary,” Ramsey said. “We do not know where they are going, who’s caring for them, who’s educating them, and the safety.”
For infants and toddlers, average child care reportedly costs more than $12,530 per year, according to a report from Children First, and around $9,800 for after-school and summer instruction. However, advocates expect those figures to climb.
“We’re hearing so clearly how much it costs to provide high-quality care, but our parents can’t afford to pay these increasing prices, and the parents that need it the most, the parents that absolutely must work every day are the ones that can afford it the least and so this is a completely failed business model,” said Montgomery County Commissioners Chairwoman Val Arkoosh.
Along with Arkoosh, state Rep. Matt Bradford, D-70th, Dist., and state Sen. Amanda Cappelletti, D-17th Dist., represented state and county officials at the roundtable. U.S. Rep. Madeleine Dean, D-4th Dist, attended via video conference.
“We should absolutely provide these services to every kid in Norristown, and in Montgomery County and in the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania,” Bradford said. “But the reality is — when our child care breaks down when it is stretched to the limit, which it currently is here in this commonwealth, and frankly across this country, it is the business community that is unable to attract and retain the best of our employees.”
Around $12 million was directed to child care assistance efforts during the COVID-19 pandemic, according to the Children First report.
The 2020 Coronavirus Aid, Relief, and Economic Security Act allocated $3.5 billion in child care-related grants, with more than $100 million of that dedicated to Pennsylvania child care and pre-K programs, according to Dean.
Facilities across Montgomery County received nearly $7 million, according to Arkoosh, who added that more than $1 million worth of personal protective equipment was distributed.
Advocates expressed their gratitude for the financial contributions at the county, state and federal levels throughout the public health crisis, but acknowledged that more work is still needed.
“There’s been enormous investment in this very critical provision of services in our county and it’s just not enough, not even close to enough,” Arkoosh said. “It’s like a drop in the bucket, and this is something that we can’t solve at the county level. We need our partners in Washington and Harrisburg to help us get this done.”
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