Jessie Schook, the vice president for workforce and economic development at the Kentucky Community and Technical College System, is also an expectant mother concerned about limited child care openings. She spoke at the unveiling of Sen. Danny Carroll's Horizon Act. From left, Jennifer Washburn, Sarah Vanover, Charles Aull and Sen. Danny Carroll. (Kentucky Lantern photo by Sarah Ladd)

FRANKFORT — When Jessie Schook, the vice president of workforce and economic development for the Kentucky Community and Technical College System, tells people she is expecting her first child in June, many want to know: “Are you on a (child care) list?”?

The wait to get a new baby into a child care center can take a year, Schook told reporters Tuesday. That’s one reason she and others gathered to unveil the Horizons Act, an ambitious two-year, $300 million bill aimed at stabilizing and supporting the child care industry in Kentucky.?

“Any woman professional, male professional, in the commonwealth, has to cope with that challenge when they find out this exciting news that their family is growing,” Schook said. They must wonder: “Am I going to have to leave my career? Am I going to have to step out of the workforce?”??

Sen. Danny Carroll, who is sponsoring the Horizons Act and filed it Tuesday, has heard similar stories. The West Kentucky Republican serves as president and CEO of Easter Seals West Kentucky, whose programs include a child care center.?

“Our families are planning the birth of their kids around the shortage of child care in our commonwealth,” he said.?

The shortage of providers isn’t the only challenge facing the industry. As the Lantern has reported, federal COVID-19 dollars are running out, leaving centers to cut pay for their workers, raise tuition for parents and even close.?

Kentucky could lose more than a fifth of its child care providers if the state doesn’t help. And even with the state help that is proposed in the House budget – a $52 million a year increase? – experts say about 16,000 kids could lose access to child care in 2024.

“This transformational piece of legislation and the accompanying $150 million per year appropriation request will go a long way towards averting the impending crisis we’re about to face if we don’t act with purpose and certainty,” Carroll said at his Tuesday press conference.?

“I would encourage my colleagues in the legislature,” he added: “This is a time that Kentucky needs to step up and be a shining example for the rest of the country. And we will reap the benefits of that if we make that decision.”?

What is in the Horizons Act??

The 50-page Horizons Act would:?

• Establish a new associate degree through KCTCS, which is Kentucky’s largest provider of postsecondary education, to train and prepare students to open an early childhood education (ECE) center upon graduation. The degree program will include training on how to spot abuse and neglect, how to teach youth between 0 and 5, the business of child care and more.?
• Add this new KCTCS degree to the Work Ready Scholarship.?
• Establish the Division of Regulated Early Childhood Education in the Office of Inspector General within the Cabinet for Health and Family Services and establish the Division of Early Childhood Education within the Department of Community Based Services. The goal is to “raise the importance of what we do,” Carroll said. The new terms replace references to “child care.” He one day wants to see a Department of Early Childhood Education within the cabinet with a commissioner.
• Create an Innovations in Early Childhood Education Delivery Program fund within CHFS. People, companies, businesses and entrepreneurs who “have ideas on non-traditional delivery models” for the industry can have access to up to $100,000 in grant money through this fund, Carroll said. The bill states that no county can get more than 20% of the fund in a single fiscal year.?
• Establish the Families Early Childhood Education Provider Startup fund, which will offer grants to Kentuckians starting traditional child care centers.?
• Codify the Child Care Assistance Program (CCAP) eligibility at 85% of the state median income. CCAP helps families with tuition. The CCAP reimbursement to providers will stay at the 80th percentile of the market rate survey, Carroll said. The CCAP portions of the bills alone will cost roughly $66 million annually, explained Sarah Vanover, the policy and research director at Kentucky Youth Advocates.?
• Direct CHFS to cover the cost of the fees for background checks to the extent funding is available.??

KCTCS already offers ECE degrees, Schook told the Lantern, but they “don’t necessarily equip an individual with the nuances of operating a business.” The new degree offering will include education on finances, marketing, human resources and more.?

“The idea here,” she said, “is we’re not just creating additional workers to be within those roles. We are positioning individuals to own and operate their own facilities.”?

It’s not yet clear if the degree would be available at all 16 colleges within the KCTCS system, Schook said. And staffing the degree with enough faculty who can teach it is “always a concern,” she said.?

“I think in general in higher ed, anytime you have a technical faculty role that you’re trying to build, it can be difficult to offer a wage that is higher than the wages that they would earn within the industry,” she said.?

But in this case, especially with people who have been in the industry for a couple of decades and have hit a cap on what the sector can afford to pay them “there’s an opportunity, I think, for us to create some type of talent attraction strategy to pull them in to help us build a pipeline.”?

What do advocates think of the bill??

With The Horizons Act, Carrol is “guaranteeing a quality future for kids, meeting the core needs of working families, and lifting local economies by bolstering Kentucky’s workforce,” Terry Brooks, executive director of Kentucky Youth Advocates, said in a statement.

“The Horizons Act puts into motion the state budget investments and policy changes necessary to stabilize Kentucky’s struggling child care sector and ensure parents can go to work knowing their child is safe and learning,” Brooks said.??

Vanover with Kentucky Youth Advocates spoke alongside Carroll and others about the bill Tuesday. His bill, she said, “has the opportunity to bolster local communities, to support families who are out in the workforce trying to support their children and give them what they need, as well as improve the education of our youngest children throughout the state.”??

“Child care is statewide infrastructure that we have to have in place to support children, families and local economies,” Vanover said. “Kentucky’s youngest children are our next workforce. And learning begins at birth, not at age five.”?

Jennifer Washburn, the director and owner at iKids Childhood Enrichment Center in West Kentucky, said Carroll’s bill gives her “hope that real change is on the horizon for Kentucky’s youngest citizens and their families.”?

Charles Aull, executive director of the Kentucky Chamber of Commerce Center for Policy and Research, also praised the legislation and said it “makes Kentucky a more competitive business climate.”

“A strong early childhood ecosystem will remove barriers to work and support workforce participation among adults,” Aull said. “This means more working parents, more self sufficiency, more taxpayers, more jobs filled and a stronger economy.”??

How does Carroll’s bill compare to previous proposals??

In his budget proposal, Gov. Andy Beshear asked the legislature to spend $141 million over the next two years to stabilize the child care industry, but advocates said that it was not enough.?

Beshear also asked for? $172 million to begin funding universal preschool for Kentucky 4-year-olds, though advocates worried that would cannibalize child care and exacerbate its challenges. That’s because, as the Lantern has reported, early childhood education centers don’t make money on children until they reach three and four years old and the ratios between them and teachers can be higher. Beshear’s proposal would have taken that demographic away from child care centers.?

“I think we’re all open to universal pre-K, but … the delivery model is where the difference lies,” Carroll said Tuesday. “The governor’s proposal would require huge investments in infrastructure, capital expenses … quite frankly, our school system is just not ready to take all of those kids in, not to mention the devastation that would cause within early childhood education.”??

“I think that proposal is a political statement not based on reality,” Carroll added.?

In an interview with the Kentucky Lantern Tuesday afternoon, Beshear said “our plan recognizes that we are asking the child care industry to change and to have the flexibility to focus on younger kids.”?

“I believe that our school system is the only entity that can address a major part of child care, though pre-k is much more than child care, and ensure it’s done in every single part of Kentucky,” Beshear said.?

The House GOP budget, approved in late January, also did not do enough for child care, advocates said. The proposed $52 million annual increase would still result in mass closures, they said.?

Carroll acknowledged his bill is “a significant amount more” than what the House proposed.

“You got to swing for the fences sometimes,” he said. “And our kids are worth it.”