Child Care Subsidies – California

Posted on October 15, 2010 by townsend

• Child care cuts force families to waiting lists, By Susan Ferriss, October 15, 2010, Sacramento Bee: “As soon as Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger used his veto power last week to slash all $256 million in funding for a child care program she uses, Daniella Scally asked for a day off work to go door to door looking for other options. All the panicked Sacramento mother of three could do was add her children’s names to waiting lists. As of Nov. 1, Scally and 30,000 other families and 55,000 children face an immediate crisis. They will lose all subsidies that help them pay for their children’s child care needs under a special program known as CalWORKs Stage 3 Child Care. Schwarzenegger vetoed the child care money and more than $700 million from other programs from the newly passed state budget in order to build the state’s reserve fund. The Stage 3 program was designed to support parents who have graduated from California’s welfare-to-work program, CalWORKs, and have been completely off all cash aid for two years and gainfully employed…”
• State vetoes cut into Valley families’ child care, By Chris Collins, October 15, 2010, Fresno Bee: “After she got off welfare four years ago, Fresno single-mom Cristina Guillen vowed to provide for her kids without relying on the welfare system again. But now cuts to a government-funded child-care program threaten to push Guillen and hundreds of other families in Fresno County out of their jobs and back onto the dole. Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger issued line-item vetoes to the state budget on Oct. 8 that totaled nearly $1 billion, including $256 million for child-care subsidies for families formerly on welfare. The cuts will affect about 1,500 families and almost 3,000 kids in Fresno County alone. Guillen, 30, had relied on the subsidies to pay for her children’s child care. With no one else available to care for her younger children while she’s at work, she said she may have to quit her job…”