Partially Updated Summit County Childcare Needs Assessment

The Early Childhood Alliance has updated some of the data sources contained within the Summit County Childcare Needs Assessment briefed to the Summit County Council on June 28, 2023. The update does not contain an updated community or provider survey, or revised demand analysis, but does update some relevant information from publicly-available data sources relating to access and affordability of childcare in Summit County.

Some key takeaways from the update include:

  • Public school enrollments and birth rates continue to decline in Summit County

  • School readiness continues to be a concern, particularly for our low-income, minority, and English-language learning students

  • Childcare continues to increase in expense

  • Utah’s childcare workforce is paid less and receives fewer benefits than the total labor force in Utah, despite having roughly equivalent levels of education

The update also highlights two encouraging changes: Park City School District’s expansion of its preschool program and Park City and Summit County investments in our local childcare ecosystem.

2023 KEEP Entry Scores Continue to Show Opportunity Gaps in School Readiness

The 2023 Kindergarten Entry and Exit (KEEP) entry scores continue to show a disappointing opportunity gap in our Summit and Wasatch County school districts, particularly for our English-language learning students.

If we want to close these opportunity gaps, we need to recognize that it is essential to invest early so that all children have an equal opportunity to a quality educational foundation that will prepare them to grow, learn, and succeed.

Childcare is Essential and Requires Significant Investment from Summit County

Every child deserves an equal opportunity to a quality educational foundation that will prepare them to grow, learn, and succeed.

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Every child deserves an equal opportunity to a quality educational foundation that will prepare them to grow, learn, and succeed. -

As we get closer to the end of the year, Summit County Council is in the process of finalizing its 2024 budget. While it is great to see the county starting to invest in early care and education, our community must let council members know that our young children are a top priority and deserve substantial community investment.

Access to high-quality, affordable early care and education options for our working families is essential for our kids, our working parents, our current and future workforce, our economy, and our community-at-large. Just like K-12 education, high-quality early care and education benefits everyone. Enriching early learning opportunities are critical to brain development and lead to improved outcomes in school and later in life.

Where We Are Now:

Based upon the findings of the Summit County Childcare Needs Assessment, the Early Childhood Alliance submitted a $3 million proposal to Summit County to further improve access to and affordability of high-quality early care and education options for Summit County residents who will not qualify for assistance from Park City’s $1 million investment.

In the current Manager’s Budget Presentation, Summit County is proposing $150,000 towards Summit County employee childcare support. “Childcare expenses outside of meeting organizational needs” is included in the group of unfunded programs that merit additional discussion. Our community needs to prioritize our children’s early care and education in order to move childcare from the “unfunded programs” list into the actual budget.

Unlike funding for our children in the K-12 program (the Park City Education Foundation estimates 96% of our state-collected education tax dollars leave Park City), all of these local dollars will support our local kids and working parents.

Get Involved!

Summit County’s budget is finalized in early December, which means the next two months are critical. Please let our elected representatives know that greater accessibility to high-quality early care and learning is a worthwhile investment because it will benefit future generations by increasing regional economic growth, providing access to higher-salary jobs, and reducing government welfare dependency.

Here’s what you can do:

  • Email: Let our council members know that accessible and affordable early care and education is essential to the well-being of our community at large and that you support investing local public funds in our local kids. CountyCouncil@summitcounty.org.

  • Speak: The County Council meets on Wednesdays and typically takes public comment at 6 p.m. Meeting details and agendas are available here. You can go in person or comment via Zoom. Sign up for a time slot here.

  • Follow and Share: We will try to keep everyone updated on Instagram, Facebook, and through our webpage. Please follow and share with your own networks.

  • Join: Join community members who are organizing and planning. Join their email list here.

New To This Issue? Here’s Some Background:

As a strategic initiative of Park City Community Foundation, the Early Childhood Alliance advocates for public investment to support access to high-quality early care and education. Visit our advocacy page to learn more and read the latest update on our work in this blog post.

Employers Are Part of the Childcare Solution

“Benefits changes in 2023 are all about family. The need for heightened family support during the pandemic seems to have evolved into long-term parental benefits.”
— SHRM 2023 Employee Benefit Survey

Employers are part of the childcare solution. According to the Society for Human Resource Management, family-friendly work benefits are the fifth most important benefit behind health, retirement, leave, and flexible working benefits.

One way employers can support their employees with young children is through a dependent care flexible spending account (FSA), which allows pre-tax dollars to cover eligible childcare expenses (up to age 13), up to $5000 a year for joint and $2500 for single filers. Only the parent who has custody of the child may use an FSA. Funds can also be used to care for a spouse or relative who is physically or mentally incapable of self-care and lives with the employee. Contributions must be expended in the year they are contributed, so any unused funds will be forfeited (use-it-or-lose-it).

The dependent care FSA is offered by 57% of employers and employers can contribute to an employee’s dependent care FSA. The employer contribution can be in the form of seed contributions (automatic deposits), matching contributions (dollar-for-dollar matches based on the employee contribution) or flex credits (employer money applied to “purchase” qualified benefits from a cafeteria plan). However, the combined pretax contributions between the employer and employee cannot exceed the IRS annual maximum. Also, eligible expenses can only count once, although employees can combine the FSA with the child care tax credit which is $3000 for one child and $6000 for two or more.

In addition to dependent care FSAs, providing paid leave is essential for new parents. Over one-third (39%) of employers provide paid parental leave.

The Best Way To Close the Achievement Gap Is To Never Allow It To Develop In The First Place

The Office of the Legislative Auditor General recently released its Systemic Performance Audit of the Park City School District. One of its key findings is that the “district has opportunities to further bolster underperforming student groups through additional oversight.”

One of the primary goals of the Early Childhood Alliance is to ensure that every child is ready for kindergarten. Despite our efforts, the disparity in school readiness continues in the Park City School District. Although the numbers vary slightly year-to-year, since we started tracking the Kindergarten Entry and Exit (KEEP) entry scores in 2019, substantial opportunity gaps remain. Simply stated, our low-income, minority, and English-language learning students are disproportionately less ready for kindergarten than their peers.

Starting school at a disadvantage often inhibits future success. Prenatal and early childhood experiences form the foundation of our social, emotional, cognitive, and language development. Investing in high-quality, affordable early childhood care and education in coordination with parental support and health programs will help:

  • close the opportunity gap

  • assist local employers in attracting and retaining their workforce

  • strengthen our school districts

  • diminish intergenerational poverty, and

  • maximize our collective return on investment.

By investing local public funds in our early care and education system, all of these dollars stay local. In contrast, the Park City Education Foundation estimates that 96% of our state-collected education tax dollars go to other school districts.

We know how to solve this problem. We just need to find the will to do so.

New Final Regulations to Increase Access to Childcare Subsidies

The federal Department of Health and Human Services, Administration for Children and Families, Office of Childcare has issued the final rule (89 Fed. Reg. 15366 (March 1, 2024) (codified as 45 CFR Part 98 and effective April 30, 2024) entitled Improving Access, Affordability, and Stability in the Child Care and Development Fund. Child Care Development Block Grants are the “primary Federal funding source devoted to supporting families with low incomes access child care and to increasing the quality of child care for all children.”

As part of these changes:

  • Lead Agencies may require parent contributions of no more than 7% of family income for childcare, regardless of the number of children in care (and can set the contribution lower).

    • Lead agencies may waive co-payments for additional families such as:

      • those whose incomes are at or below 150% of the Federal Poverty level $45,000 for a family of 4),

      • children in foster or kinship care,

      • children who receive protective services,

      • children experiencing homelessness,

      • children enrolled in Head Start or Early Head Start,

      • children with a disability; or

      • children who meet other criteria established by the Lead Agency.

  • Lead Agencies are encouraged to streamline eligibility as follows:

    • define minimum presumptive eligibility criteria and verification requirements for up to 3 months while full eligibility verification is underway for those children who can plausibly be assumed to meet the basic requirements (funds should only be recovered from the provider if found ineligible due to fraud or intentional violation);

    • use a family’s enrollment in other public benefits program(s) to verify eligibility for CCDF (i.e. TANF or Head Start/Early Head Start);

    • use a streamlined online application, and implement screening tools directly linked to relevant applications;

    • align multiple children’s eligibility periods to the most-recent eligibility period (even if this extends beyond 12 months)

  • Lead Agencies must provide some childcare services through grants and contracts for children in underserved geographic areas, infants and toddlers, and children with disabilities;

  • Lead Agencies must implement payment policies consistent with the private-pay market, such as paying prospectively based on enrollment (delinking provider payment rates from occasional absences) or an alternative equally stabilizing approach approved by OCC. Lead Agencies will have the option to collect attendance information, but it would not impact payment.

  • Lead Agencies should strive to pay the established subsidy rate, even if this exceeds the price the provider charges to private-pay families.

  • Lead Agencies must base provider rates based upon findings from a market rate survey and narrow cost analysis or alternative methodology approved by OCC.

Diaper Need Is Increasing

Many of the findings are alarming, but in particular, the increase in diaper need from one-third of families to nearly one-half of families and that one-quarter of families miss work or school due to lack of diapers and/or skip meals to afford diapers demonstrates the extreme need.

We are proud to partner with the Utah Diaper Bank to deliver diapers to many fantastic community partners that serve young families such as the People’s Health Clinic, Holy Cross Ministries, Wasatch Pediatrics, the Park City Library, PC Tots, Summit County Early Intervention Program, Summit County Women, Infants and Children (WIC) Program, the St. Gabriel Project, and the Christian Center of Park City.

This is an essential need in our community and we must work together to ensure that our youngest community members have the basic essentials they need to thrive. Please help us raise awareness and resources to address this critical issue.