U.S. GOVERNMENT PRINTING OFFICE

WASHINGTON : 

For sale by the Superintendent of Documents, U.S. Government Printing Office

Internet: bookstore.gpo.gov Phone: toll free (866) 512–1800; DC area (202) 512–1800

Fax: (202) 512–2250 Mail: Stop SSOP, Washington, DC 20402–0001

78–615 PDF ★ STAR PRINT 2002

S. Hrg. 107–377

GOOD BEGINNINGS LAST A LIFETIME: HOW THE

FEDERAL GOVERNMENT CAN PROMOTE

AFFORDABLE, QUALITY CHILD CARE

HEARING

BEFORE THE

OVERSIGHT OF GOVERNMENT MANAGEMENT,

RESTRUCTURING, AND THE DISTRICT OF COLUMBIA

SUBCOMMITTEE

OF THE

COMMITTEE ON

GOVERNMENTAL AFFAIRS

UNITED STATES SENATE

ONE HUNDRED SEVENTH CONGRESS

SECOND SESSION

FIELD HEARING HELD AT ST. LOUIS, MISSOURI

JANUARY 28, 2002

Printed for the use of the Committee on Governmental Affairs

(

(II)

COMMITTEE ON GOVERNMENTAL AFFAIRS

JOSEPH I. LIEBERMAN, Connecticut, Chairman

CARL LEVIN, Michigan

DANIEL K. AKAKA, Hawaii

RICHARD J. DURBIN, Illinois

ROBERT G. TORRICELLI, New Jersey

MAX CLELAND, Georgia

THOMAS R. CARPER, Delaware

JEAN CARNAHAN, Missouri

MARK DAYTON, Minnesota

FRED THOMPSON, Tennessee

TED STEVENS, Alaska

SUSAN M. COLLINS, Maine

GEORGE V. VOINOVICH, Ohio

PETE V. DOMENICI, New Mexico

THAD COCHRAN, Mississippi

ROBERT F. BENNETT, Utah

JIM BUNNING, Kentucky

JOYCE A. RECHTSCHAFFEN, Staff Director and Counsel

HANNAH S. SISTARE, Minority Staff Director and Counsel

DARLA D. CASSELL, Chief Clerk

OVERSIGHT OF GOVERNMENT MANAGEMENT, RESTRUCTURING, AND

THE DISTRICT OF COLUMBIA SUBCOMMITTEE

RICHARD J. DURBIN, Illinois, Chairman

DANIEL K. AKAKA, Hawaii

ROBERT G. TORRICELLI, New Jersey

THOMAS R. CARPER, Delaware

JEAN CARNAHAN, Missouri

MARK DAYTON, Minnesota

GEORGE V. VOINOVICH, Ohio

TED STEVENS, Alaska

SUSAN M. COLLINS, Maine

PETE V. DOMENICI, New Mexico

THAD COCHRAN, Mississippi

MARIANNE CLIFFORD UPTON, Staff Director and Chief Counsel

ANGELA BENANDER, Legislative Assistant to Senator Durbin

SANDY FRIED, Legislative Assistant to Senator Carnahan

LISA JAWORSKI, Legislative Aide to Senator Carnahan

CAROLINE PELOT, Deputy Director, Eastern Missouri to Senator Carnahan

ANDREW RICHARDSON, Minority Staff Director

JULIE L. VINCENT, Chief Clerk

(III)

C O N T E N T S

Opening statements: Page

Senator Durbin ................................................................................................. 1

Senator Carnahan ............................................................................................ 3

WITNESSES

MONDAY, JANUARY 28, 2002

Lisa Eberle-Mayse, M.A., Director, Childgarden Child Development Center .... 4

Steve J. Cok, a parent of children in day care ...................................................... 6

Jo Ann Harris, a parent of children in day care ................................................... 8

Janice Moenster, a parent of children in day care ................................................ 9

Teresa M. Jenkins, Director, Office of Workforce Relations, U.S. Office of

Personnel Management ....................................................................................... 17

Sarah Kirschner, Missouri Childcare at Work ...................................................... 18

Penny Korte, Daycare Owner/Director, P.A.L.S., Highland, Illinois ................... 21

Corinne Patton, Manager, Missouri Child Care Resource and Referral Network ....................................................................................................................... 23

Kim E. Hunt, Illinois Network of Child Care Resource and Referral Agencies

(INCCRRA) ........................................................................................................... 26

ALPHABETICAL LIST OF WITNESSES

Cok, Steve J.:

Testimony .......................................................................................................... 6

Prepared statement .......................................................................................... 37

Eberle-Mayse, Lisa, M.A.:

Testimony .......................................................................................................... 4

Prepared statement .......................................................................................... 33

Harris, Jo Ann:

Testimony .......................................................................................................... 8

Prepared statement .......................................................................................... 39

Hunt, Kim E.:

Testimony .......................................................................................................... 26

Prepared statement .......................................................................................... 62

Jenkins, Teresa M.:

Testimony .......................................................................................................... 17

Prepared statement .......................................................................................... 43

Kirschner, Sarah:

Testimony .......................................................................................................... 18

Prepared statement .......................................................................................... 52

Korte, Penny:

Testimony .......................................................................................................... 21

Prepared statement .......................................................................................... 56

Moenster, Janice:

Testimony .......................................................................................................... 9

Prepared statement .......................................................................................... 40

Patton, Corinne:

Testimony .......................................................................................................... 23

Prepared statement .......................................................................................... 58

APPENDIX

Janet E. Maruna, Director, Early Childhood and Family Services, letter dated

January 25, 2002, with general views ................................................................ 65

(1)

GOOD BEGINNINGS LAST A LIFETIME: HOW

THE FEDERAL GOVERNMENT CAN PROMOTE AFFORDABLE, QUALITY CHILD CARE

MONDAY, JANUARY 28, 2002

U.S. SENATE,

OVERSIGHT OF GOVERNMENT MANAGEMENT, RESTRUCTURING,

AND THE DISTRICT OF COLUMBIA SUBCOMMITTEE,

OF THE COMMITTEE ON GOVERNMENTAL AFFAIRS, Washington, DC.

The Subcommittee met, pursuant to notice, at 10:06 a.m., at the

Childgarden Child Development Center, 4150 Laclede Avenue, St.

Louis, Missouri, Hon. Richard Durbin, Chairman of the Subcommittee, presiding.

Present: Senators Durbin and Carnahan.

OPENING STATEMENT OF SENATOR DURBIN

Senator DURBIN. Good morning. I want to thank all of you for

joining us today at this field hearing of the Senate Subcommittee

on the Oversight of Government Management. I am particularly

happy to be here in St. Louis with my good friend and fellow Subcommittee Member, Senator Jean Carnahan. Thank you for joining

us today in discussing a topic of importance to families all around

America.

I come across the river from Illinois. But since I grew up in East

St. Louis, I know the St. Louis area a little bit. And it is great to

be over here on this side of the river to meet with Jean and to talk

about an issue that I think you will find, during the course of the

day, is important to so many families.

Typically, we conduct our hearings on Capitol Hill, but these

hearings on the road give us a chance to meet with people and face

their real problems. I can not think of a more appropriate setting

to have a hearing on child care issues than this facility, which is

innovative and colorful. Jean and I have had a chance to walk

around to some of the classrooms and see the kids, who are in good

hands, and apparently still celebrating the Rams’ victory.

Jean has been an enthusiastic champion in the U.S. Senate on

the issue we are examining today: How are we going to be able to

provide affordable, quality child care for working families across

America. Primarily as a result of Senator Carnahan’s leadership,

Congress enacted legislation last November permanently authorizing the use of appropriated funds by executive agencies to provide

child care services for Federal civilian employees. She deserves a

2

round of applause. I was proud to be a co-sponsor of Senator

Carnahan’s bill.

Parents rely on outside child care arrangements now more than

ever. Whether by choice or necessity, balancing the competing demands of work and raising a family is a terrific challenge. The

Children’s Defense Fund reports that an estimated 13 million children under the age of six spend part of their day in the care of

someone other than their parents. The U.S. Census Bureau reported for the first time in 1998 a majority, 51 percent of married

couple families, had children and both parents had at least a parttime job. That is up from 33 percent in 1976. In my home State

of Illinois, 61 percent of all children under the age of six have

working parents.

When I grew up, of course, my mother worked. But she was

home during the early years of my life. And then when my wife

and I were raising our three kids, my wife stayed home and gave

them special attention and care. And it was not until our first

grandson came along and I started talking to my daughter about

him that I realized that someone was going to have Alex all day

long. And I said, ‘‘Who are these people who are going to have my

grandson?’’ This was an important issue. Well, it is an issue that

families face every single day. More and more families are turning

to child care arrangements outside the home.

Working families also have to struggle to pay for it, to try to

make sure that they have the very best care that they can afford.

Full day care can cost $4,000 to $10,000 a year, surpassing sometimes the tuition costs of public universities. According to 2000

data, child care for a 4-year-old child in the urban area of Illinois

costs an average of $5,300 a year. Average public college tuition in

Illinois was $3,845 a year. At the same time, Children’s Defense

Fund reports that more than one of the four families with young

children earn less than $25,000 a year.

The child care profession is also a demanding job. We want to

make sure the very best men and women are taking care of our

kids and grandkids. And a recent report by Education Week reveals

the startling fact that a child care professional in the United States

can expect to earn about as much as a parking lot attendant in the

course of a year. Think about that. Someone is being paid as much

or more to watch an empty car than to guard our greatest treasure:

Our kids. In Illinois, child care workers fared slightly better than

average, with an average annual income of $18,000 a year.

We know there is a big gap between what children need and

what we are providing them. And the Federal Government has an

interest in making sure that families do have the very best tools

so that their kids can grow up in a very positive and learning environment.

A century ago, we learned the importance of a public investment

in public education. It has paid off. It has made America a greater

Nation. Now we have education reaching down to infancy, education at centers just like this one, where you have good, qualified

people helping kids to learn the basics, spending an important part

of each day with them.

3

We are going to be hearing from several panels, but first I would

like to recognize and thank her for her leadership: Senator Jean

Carnahan.

OPENING STATEMENT OF SENATOR CARNAHAN

Senator CARNAHAN. Thank you, Mr. Chairman, and welcome to

Missouri. We share not only a common border, but we also share

a common concern for our youngest and most vulnerable citizens.

I am pleased that we have the opportunity today to put the spotlight on the issue of child care.

As a mother of four and a grandmother of two, I know firsthand

how much children learn and develop in those early years. They

are exciting times. Every day is full of new experiences, new lessons, and new accomplishments. A child’s brain, as we all know, is

literally like a sponge. It soaks up everything around, appreciating

the small joys in life that sometimes we adults let go unnoticed.

Parents have known for a long time what research is now only

proving: That development in those early years is key to a child’s

success. What does that mean in terms of child care? It means that

quality matters. It matters not only for those early years, but for

a lifetime.

This is not news to any of you in this room. You are the parents,

and you are struggling to find a place that is good for your children

that is within your means. And you are the child care center directors who work to create quality learning environments with insufficient resources. And you are child care workers who make a real

difference in children’s lives but barely make above the minimum

wage. We ask a lot of each of you, and I want to recognize the outstanding contribution that you make to the lives of our children.

The problems in the current child care system are not news to

you, because you strive to overcome them every day. However, I

think that many Americans would be shocked to learn about the

gap between what we want for our kids and what the current system is actually able to provide.

The reality is that child care is expensive, and parents can only

afford to pay so much. Child care is a significant expense even for

well-to-do families. It can be an insurmountable expense for lowto middle-income families. They have to make difficult choices

about how to pay for child care, and all their other bills as well.

Today, we will hear from Jo Ann Harris about the sacrifices that

she is making for her family to pay for her child care bill.

To have a quality learning environment for children, you need a

trained staff. A child care director is competing for staff just like

every other business. But while the little ones needing our care are

priceless, the wages of the care givers are often low and cannot

compete with higher paying, less demanding jobs in other fields.

Even after a child care worker is hired, on average, 30 to 40 percent will leave in less than a year. About 70 percent of the average

child care center’s budget is allocated for labor costs, and parents

are not likely to be able to afford to pay more.

How can this situation be improved? How can this self-perpetuating cycle be changed? These are difficult questions with no easy

answers. Today we will hear from Lisa Eberle-Mayse, the director

of this beautiful center, speaking about how she manages to balVerDate 11-MAY-2000 12:11 Dec 12, 2002 Jkt 000000 PO 00000 Frm 00007 Fmt 6633 Sfmt 6633 83194.TXT SAFFAIRS PsN: SAFFAIRS
4

1The prepared statement of Ms. Eberle-Mayse appears in the Appendix on page 33.

ance the competing demands. These are real challenges even for

model centers such as Childgarden.

Today we will hear from the stakeholders involved in child care

in Missouri and Illinois about their experiences and concerns, and

their suggestions for how to improve the current child care system.

We will explore the resources that are available to parents, businesses, child care workers, and child care centers to make better,

more informed decisions. And we will also identify ways the Federal Government can assist families and employers and child care

providers in the search for affordable quality child care.

Last year, I introduced legislation to assist low-income Federal

workers afford their care. And I am pleased to report that the proposal passed both houses of Congress, and President Bush has

passed it into law.

As this hearing will highlight, there is a shortage of trained professional child care workers. I will be announcing a plan that will

pull together the resources of businesses, educational institutions,

and government to address this pressing need. The proposal will be

a public/private partnership aimed at three goals: (1) recruiting

new people to enter the child care profession, (2) upgrading the

quality of child care staff, and (3) creating incentives for civic, business, and not-for-profit participation in these efforts. I will reach

out to the relevant child care stakeholders in Missouri, including

parents and employers, to ensure that their views are represented.

I would like to extend my thanks to all of you today, all the panelists who will be speaking, and the audience for joining us today.

Mr. Chairman.

Senator DURBIN. Thank you very much, Senator. We will be

hearing from two panels of witnesses, and I will call the first panel,

which will describe the key challenges faced in obtaining and providing child care services, including availability, quality, and affordability. The second panel will be talking about best practices

and innovative solutions which we might be able to use as national

models. Let me welcome the first panel of witnesses, if they would

please come forward. Lisa Eberle-Mayse, director of Childgarden,

our host today. Thank you for being with us. Steve Cok is here. Jo

Ann Harris from St. Louis. And Janice Muenster of Highland, Illinois. Mr. Cok, Ms. Harris, and Ms. Muenster are all working parents residing in Missouri and Illinois who depend on out-of-home

child care for their kids. Thank you all for coming. We look forward

to hearing your testimony.

If you could confine your spoken statements to 5 minutes, we will

make sure that your written statements in their entirety are made

part of the record. And then Senator Carnahan and I will ask some

questions. Ms. Eberle-Mayse, would you like to kick off. And thank

you again for opening up Childgarden for this meeting today.

TESTIMONY OF LISA EBERLE-MAYSE, M.A.,1 DIRECTOR,

CHILDGARDEN CHILD DEVELOPMENT CENTER

Ms. EBERLE-MAYSE. Absolutely. We are very glad to be able to

host.

5

My name is Lisa Eberle-Mayse, and I am the director of

Childgarden Child Development Center, which is an Easter Seals

and St. Louis ARC child development center. Childgarden is an

accredited early childhood program committed to providing the

highest quality care and education. The center serves children and

families from a wide range of socio-economic levels, racial, and ethnic backgrounds. We are intentionally inclusive of children with

special needs, with more than 25 percent of the children enrolled

having a diagnosed disability or developmental delay. In addition

to child care, we also offer therapy services for children with special needs.

Childgarden opened its doors in 1989 with this commitment to

diversity and inclusion, and in specific response to the fact that it

is extremely difficult for families of children with special needs to

find appropriate child care. We remain committed today because

this need still exists, and because of the long-term impact of this

philosophy. In a world that all too often fosters separation and segregation, the children of Childgarden grow up learning and growing

together, exploring and celebrating the things that make us the

same and the things that make us different. It is our passionate

belief that these early experiences will yield a lifetime of benefit as

these children carry a greater sense of tolerance into adulthood.

Fulfilling this vision requires one thing above all others: A staff

comprised of individuals who actively choose to do this work, who

have the knowledge and skills to do their jobs well. At Childgarden, we are proud of our staff and the care, dedication, expertise, and love that they show to our children each and every day.

However, attracting and retaining such a staff is without question the single biggest challenge we, and other child care providers,

face every single day. Unemployment remains at low levels, which

has driven up wages across many industries. The impact for child

care is profound. In addition to competing for qualified candidates

within our own field, we find ourselves competing with fast food

restaurants, retail stores, and other industries. Yet the vast majority of child care providers cannot simply increase their fees to cover

the current actual cost of care, much less to cover significant raises

for staff, because only a handful of families could afford such increases.

For example, at Childgarden, while our weekly infant fee is $198,

the true cost of care for an infant is $324, or roughly $17,000 per

year. According to the U.S. Census Bureau, the median family income for a family of four in Missouri is roughly $56,000 a year. The

full cost of care in this situation would be 30 percent of the family’s

gross income, and that is a pretty significant figure. The impact becomes more real, however, when you consider that 50 percent of

families fall below that median income.

Consider another example. In the State of Missouri, a family of

four earning $22,000 per year is not eligible for any State assistance with their child care costs. For this family, paying the true

cost of care for one infant would represent 77 percent of the family’s income. The result? In our case, with no significant funding

stream for child care scholarships, the result is fees that push the

limits of families’ abilities to pay, but that do not cover the true

6

1The prepared statement of Mr. Cok appears in the Appendix on page 37.

cost of operating a center. This, in turn, leads to continued low

staff wages and higher staff turnover.

The most recent statistics from the Center for the Child Care

Workforce tell us that, nationally, the mean hourly wage for child

care workers is $7.42. Occupations earning higher mean wages include service station attendants, tree trimmers, and food service

workers. These low wages lead to turnover rates that range from

a low of 25 percent annually to well over 60 percent. And the saddest truth behind these statistics is that even individuals with the

education, the skills, and the desire to remain in child care must

sometimes choose to leave it in order to support themselves and

their families.

The impact of this cycle on our children and on our future as a

Nation is enormous. We know from current research that, in order

to learn and develop, children need to be actively engaged with an

environment that is carefully designed. We know that children

must have primary care givers with whom they can have strong relationships, and that these care givers must be knowledgeable

about child development, a lot to ask of someone working for an

hourly wage of $7.42.

And yet we do ask it, and we will continue to ask it, because the

needs of our children and our future demand no less. For centers

like Childgarden who are fortunate enough to have the financial

and program support of two established parent agencies and assistance from the United Way, the St. Louis Variety Club, and other

donors, the task is a little easier. We are able to be relatively competitive within our field. We are not, however, able to come close

to wages paid by Head Start, early childhood programs within the

public schools, or other service industries outside the field of child

care.

It is sometimes said that one does not solve a problem simply by

throwing money at it. While those of us in the field of child care

would absolutely acknowledge the importance of good stewardship

of our resources, the plain and simple fact is this: Sometimes there

are problems that need money thrown at them. The care and education of our youngest children, our future, is one of them.

Thank you for the opportunity to speak this morning and for

your interest in supporting our future.

Senator DURBIN. Thanks, Lisa. Steve, you will be the first of

three witnesses, parents who are dealing with finding good day

care. Can you tell us your experience. And with your testimony, we

will make it all part of the record. Give us 5 minutes of summary.

TESTIMONY OF STEVEN J. COK,1 A PARENT OF CHILDREN IN

DAY CARE

Mr. COK. Thank you for inviting me to this panel. My name is

Steven Cok. My wife and I have two children: Philip, who is 71⁄2,

and Nina, who is five. We both have full-time jobs and are highly

dependent on child care outside of the home.

We have had experiences with two day cares: First, the Child

Enrichment Center, or CEC, which is housed and governed by the

Richmond Heights Presbyterian Church, and second, Zelda Epstein

7

Day Care Center, which I refer to as Zelda’s, which is corporatesponsored day care.

Our experiences at the two day care centers shared similarities,

but also had distinct differences. Both centers are not-for-profit,

relatively small, and had warm family-like atmospheres. More importantly, these centers had a core group of teachers that were

warm, loving, and had been working at the center for an extended

period of time.

CEC offered services for infant and toddlers, and was able to

maintain these rooms at full capacity. However, there was a large

attrition rate for children greater than 2 years old. And since the

payroll of the day care was funded entirely by tuition income, a

large variation in children enrolled for the older-aged classrooms

created a financial burden to the day care as a whole. The church

lacked the financial resources to make up for budget deficits, and

in some instances, the director was forced to lay off employees in

order to balance the budget. When enrollment increased, they were

required to search for replacement teachers to maintain the proper

student-teacher ratios. These circumstances created overall instability to the day care environment, and the best-qualified and hardest-working teachers were over-tasked with filling in for teacher

vacancies.

Finally, because CEC had operated with limited financial resources, they were unable to provide competitive salaries and employee benefits, which made it even harder to attract qualified

child care providers.

Ultimately, fire safety regulations required the child care center

undergo extensive renovations. And the inability to perform these

changes resulted in closing of the day care.

Zelda’s is also financed through tuition income, and fluctuations

in enrollment create significant strains on balancing the budget. In

contrast to the CEC, budget deficits are corrected with loans from

the sponsoring business. Moreover, Zelda’s is able to provide teachers with the same employee benefits as company employees. And

all of these factors contribute to the ability to attract and maintain

qualified teachers, which provides a strong sense of stability and

security for the staff and the parents. And I believe that providing

a dedicated and qualified staff is crucial to a successful day care

center and, most importantly, to the well-being of the children.

During the course of our day care experience, we have been challenged with some very difficult decisions. When Philip reached 2

years of age, he was moved to a new classroom with a new day care

provider. It was clear from the beginning that he was not happy

and obviously not adjusting to the new situation. Additionally, we

were not satisfied with the quality of the day care provider. My

wife and I adjusted our normal work schedules such that Philip

spent the least required time in the day care. Knowing that our son

was not happy created constant strain on us as parents, and it became increasingly difficult for us to concentrate on our normal

daily tasks. It is hard enough to leave your child in the care of

someone other than yourself, and it becomes nearly unbearable

when you know that the child is truly unhappy.

It was at this point that we chose to move Philip from CEC to

Zelda’s, and from the moment we enrolled Philip, we knew we had

8

1The prepared statement of Ms. Harris appears in the Appendix on page 39.

made the right decision. He made an immediate bond to his day

care provider, and responded to the secure and loving environment

that permeated the entire center. Our son’s happiness was also reflected in the general well-being of our home and work life.

When we joined Zelda’s, the day care was made up of a diverse

group of people that represented a variety of racial and social economic classes. Over time, this diversity began to disappear. The

board of directors decided that the demographics of the center no

longer reflected that of the community that the day care was

charged to serve. It was at this point that Zelda’s formed its scholarship fund. The scholarship fund provides tuition assistance based

on income and family size.

Since formation of the scholarship fund, Zelda’s has seen an increase in minority representation at the day care center, and the

majority of these were eligible for the scholarship assistance.

My family is lucky. We were able to find quality day care for our

children, and we have been able to afford it. This is not always the

case for other families. As a member of the board of directors of

Zelda’s, I am proud that we were able to initiate a scholarship program so that lower income families can afford quality day care for

their children too.

And as the number of families with two working parents increases, so does the demand for quality affordable day care. It is

increasingly difficult for not-for-profit day care centers to compete

for qualified, well-trained care providers. And the ability to provide

a choice for a safe, loving, and stable day care environment is the

minimum that this country should offer to working parents.

Thank you.

Senator DURBIN. Thank you very much, Mr. Cok. Jo Ann Harris.

TESTIMONY OF JO ANN HARRIS,1 A PARENT OF CHILDREN IN

DAY CARE

Ms. HARRIS. Good morning. My name is Jo Ann Harris, and I am

22 years old. My family consists of my husband, who is 26, my 2-

year-old daughter, Aliyah, and my 4-year-old son, Keith. I am very

grateful to have an opportunity to share my family’s experiences

with child care, because my husband and I both work full time, and

we do not have a lot of help from relatives. So it is essential that

we have a reliable and trustworthy environment for our children

to be in 40 or more hours every week.

My children attend preschool at South Side Day Nursery, which

is located on Iowa at Arsenal in South St. Louis. My children arrive at the center at 7:30 a.m. and are picked up at 5:30 p.m. Monday through Friday. Therefore, my children are in school up to 50

hours every week.

The tuition I pay at South Side Day Nursery is based on our

household income, and my children’s tuition is $100 per week,

which averages to $400 per month. I do not like to complain about

the cost of my child care, because I have checked into prices at

many other centers, and we are very fortunate and blessed to have

found the quality of child care that we have for the price that we

pay.

9

1The prepared statement of Ms. Moenster appears in the Appendix on page 40.

But still, at times, my family has found it difficult even to afford the $400 a month with other household bills. I have been working

a second job one night a week as a waitress, specifically to pay for

child care each week. However, income reviews at the center are

coming up in a month, and I am almost positive that, with the second job, the tuition fees will increase because my income has increased.

But regardless of cost, quality child care is a necessity to working

families. And I have had experiences with other centers when my

children were younger that cost more than their current center, but

did not have the quality of their current center. I could not afford

a reputable center, so I had to take my children, who were not old

enough to verbally communicate at the time, to a home-based day

care center that was not very responsible or stimulating to my children’s development. And as a mother, that was very unsettling for

me, because I had no other alternative and no way to afford better

child care for my children.

But now my children have been at their current center for 2

years, and I do not have to worry about them when I am at work,

because I see their scheduled curriculum every week, and their

teachers are genuinely concerned about my children’s progress.

I would suggest to any parent who is looking for child care to

look into a few different centers before committing to one. There

are quite a few Head Start locations here in St. Louis that offer

tuition fees that are based on sliding scales, as do a lot of other

centers that, in my opinion, are very good quality centers.

What I hope is accomplished from this hearing is foolproof monitoring of parents’ work or school attendance that do receive child

care aid so that child care benefits are not abused. I think it would

be fair to offer middle class families partial or temporary child care

assistance based upon their income, their family size, and possible

emergency situations. And as compensation for the aid, I think it

would be very beneficial to families on aid and to the child care facilities if the family was required to attend monthly or weekly

meetings, conferences, and support groups that many centers offer.

And that is basically it. Thank you very much for your time.

Senator DURBIN. Thank you for your testimony. Janice Moenster.

TESTIMONY OF JANICE MOENSTER,1 A PARENT OF CHILDREN

IN DAY CARE

Ms. MOENSTER. Thank you, Senator Durbin and Senator Carnahan, for the invitation to speak this morning. My name is Janice

Moenster, and I represent a two-parent working family with two

children.

Having two children, we have used almost every type of child

care available: Relative care, family child care, center-based care,

Illinois State Board of Education Pre-K at Risk, and most recently,

school-age care. I am going to talk specifically about one experience

that had a tremendous impact on our family.

When our son was three, we were using a family child care provider, and she recommended that we take our son to the early

childhood screening offered by the school district. We took our son,

10

and 3 months later, we were notified that our son had some speech

and auditory delays. The good news was that he qualified for the

State Board of Education Pre-K at Risk program. The bad news

was that the program ran from 8:30 to 11:30, Monday through

Thursday, 9 months out of the year, and there was no transportation, and the program was 20 miles away from where we lived.

In addition, all parents had to volunteer once a month in the classroom.

We knew our son needed the services in order to be ready to

enter school ready to learn. But the challenges of how do we get

him to and from the program, how do we volunteer in the program

without losing our jobs, and who will care for our son when he is

not in pre-K, will our current family child care provider accept our

son for part-time care, or would we have to find new child care.

After several stressful months and emotional moments, we

worked things out. My employer understood my situation, and I

worked my flex schedule. I organized a car pool and paid someone

to car pool. Our family child care provider cared for our son part

time, but we paid full-time care rates.

Our family was fortunate. We found solutions to our problems.

The big question is how many other families can not work through

these issues, and how many children go unserved.

Every parent wants to provide the best for their children. Sometimes, our ability to provide the best is not within our reach because of a variety of challenges, including a lack of financial resources to afford the best and highest-quality child care. Our family

did not qualify for any child care assistance programs, and highquality child care is expensive. However, it is an expense we felt

was well worth it. When both of our children were in child care,

we spent 15 percent of our gross family income on child care. Child

care was our biggest monthly expense, higher than our mortgage

or even food cost.

Even when finances are not a barrier, you are presented with additional challenges, and that is a lack of accessible child care that

meets your needs for an infant, a school-ager, or even a child with

special needs; or finding a child care program that provides child

care services on the weekend or midnight, which is very common

for parents doing shift work; lack of extended family or a role

model who can provide parenting support or education, information, and are resources on how to be a good parent; how to promote

reading; or recognizing red flags in children’s development; or even

understanding developmental milestones so, as a parent, you have

appropriate expectations for your children.

Another challenge is the lack of employers who recognize that

balancing work and family responsibilities is extremely difficult.

Employers find that employees are more committed and more loyal

to their employers when they support them with flexible workplace

programs and policies that show they care about their people.

How can Federal Government improve and support child care

and families? First and foremost, we, as a society, must acknowledge that all families, regardless of income, should have access to

the highest quality child care possible, and that child care should

include all children. Recognize that one size does not fit all. Families need a variety of program options to meet their needs. ProVerDate 11-MAY-2000 12:11 Dec 12, 2002 Jkt 000000 PO 00000 Frm 00014 Fmt 6633 Sfmt 6633 83194.TXT SAFFAIRS PsN: SAFFAIRS
11

grams that provide full-day care, half-day care, full year, evening,

weekend, before school, after school, and more are needed.

All families are confronted with difficult times because of unemployment, exposure to substance abuse, sexual abuse, domestic violence, and mental health issues. Comprehensive social service support should be accessible and readily available to families.

We have all heard the slogan, ‘‘Good beginnings last a lifetime.’’

Then let us give children and families a good beginning by continuing to fund or even expanding funding to programs like Parents as First Teachers, model parental training programs, and

child care resource and referral programs that provide information,

education, and support to families. Through proper support, families can be the most important teacher to their children.

And support the other care givers that shape and mold our children, such as family child care providers, child care center staff,

Head Start staff, early intervention, directors, and even grandparents and relatives who take on the care-giving role. This support is critical. Too many care givers leave the business of caregiving because of the lack of pay, benefits, respect, and growth

opportunities. We need investments in the care giver through programs like T.E.A.C.H., Great START, credentialing, college loan

forgiveness programs and other incentives, and livable wages so

that people will want to enter the profession of teaching.

When both of my children finally entered school, I assumed that

my child care dilemmas were over, and that assumption is incorrect. School-age care is even more difficult to find since care is

needed on a sporadic basis like holidays, school closings, or teacher

in-service training days. Many families resort to leaving their children at home alone, without adult supervision. Therefore, incentives for schools to provide before- and after-school care on the

premises is also encouraged, as well as full-year schooling.

Curriculums for schools and child care should also focus on the

whole child. A child’s intellect, as well as their social and emotional

capabilities, should be developed through character education programs, violence prevention, or even the peace builders program.

Last, provide more incentives or give recognition to employers

who provide vouchers for child care or provide on-site child care or

provide innovative workplace programs and policies.

The children are our future. Good beginnings do last a lifetime.

Let us put actions to our words.

Senator DURBIN. Thank you. Thanks for your testimony.

It strikes me that, if you try to step back and look at the big picture and a little bit of history, that we are in an unusual moment.

Basically, education as we view it in America was defined in the

19th Century. We decided in the 19th Century that, at the age of

five, society would have an obligation to children to create public

education. We also decided in the 19th Century that it was a pretty

good idea for schools to be in operation only 9 months out of the

year, because kids had to get back and work on the farm. And we

also decided that turning loose kids at 2:30 or 3 o’clock in the afternoon was perfect, because Ozzie and Harriet were waiting at home

with cookies and milk. My, how the world has changed.

12

Janice, your testimony here talks about how important it was for

your child to get special attention and special help at an early age.

Son or daughter?

Ms. MUENSTER. Son.

Senator DURBIN. Your son, so he would be ready to come into the

classroom and learn. And so early intervention and early opportunity made all the difference in terms of what he needed. So his

education started a lot younger than the five years of age, thank

goodness.

You had a lot of help from your employer. It sounds like your employer was pretty supportive. What is your advice to us in terms

of encouraging employers to be more receptive and more cooperative?

Ms. MOENSTER. Well, I think that many employers look at on-site

child care as the first option. And I think typically that really

should be the last option. I think employers really need to look at

their policies in place. Can they take sick time for both their children as well as for yourself. Are there opportunities to really look

at flexing people’s starting and ending times. Or looking at 10-hour

work days versus the traditional 8-hour day, or 40-hour work week.

So I think employers need to be aware of options. I think they need

some incentives to do that. It does not work for all employers. It

depends on what kind of employer they are.

Senator DURBIN. And I think we have to share the success stories.

Ms. MOENSTER. Yes, absolutely.

Senator DURBIN. When employers cooperate, and they get a lot

more productivity and morale out of their employees, that is a plus

for businesses.

Ms. MOENSTER. And I think it is also economy driven. Right now,

there is not this huge drive to find employees to work. And so employers do not have to offer wonderful packages to attract employees. Right now, employees are just thankful to have a job.

Senator DURBIN. Jo Ann, do you sense that this hill is getting

steeper? The more you work, the more you are going to have to

pay?

Ms. HARRIS. Oh, yes. Luckily, my day care center and my job has

both helped me a lot in both aspects also. I am not exactly sure

what type of increases are going to go as far as getting more income in per month. But we are on a sliding fee scale, so I do know

I am making $400 more a month. So that could possibly put me

up in a higher bracket. But hopefully, though, I will be able to just

stay on my feet, keep my head up.

The day care center helps a lot as far as they even offer side

scholarships of that sort to help reduce your rates even further

when you do fall upon emergencies. So I was really blessed that

they had those basically available to me such as scholarships and

things like that, because had I been at a regular child care facility

and was paying full fees, that did not offer sliding fees, my kids

would have been out of day care, and I would have lost my job.

Senator DURBIN. Steve, now you found that Zelda’s is a much

better opportunity for your children, and you are involved in it personally. Is it a company sponsorship?

Mr. COK. Yes, INDEECO Corporation.

13

Senator DURBIN. And do they put a substantial subsidy into the

operation of the center?

Mr. COK. Well, the center would not be operating at this point

if it were not for INDEECO. The budget shortfalls always occur because you have basically a group of people that are eventually

going to leave. And that is where all of your income comes from.

And they all leave at the same time. But they do not all come in

at the same time. And so there is a lot of balancing the books that

is necessary. And without INDEECO acting, basically, as a friendly

bank, I think this day care would have fallen apart, or we would

have lost teachers.

Senator DURBIN. Lisa, let me ask you about the teachers. Does

Childgarden offer health insurance for its employees?

Ms. EBERLE-MAYSE. Yes. We offer it currently for the individual

staff member at a very low cost. The cost for staff who have children, the coverage for the dependents is not something we have

been able to do much with yet, and that is pretty high.

Senator DURBIN. My experience, in looking around my State and

asking people, is that a lot of day care facilities do not offer health

insurance.

Ms. EBERLE-MAYSE. No. They can not afford to.

Senator DURBIN. They can not afford to because, obviously, it is

expensive. And that expense has to be passed along to parents who

are struggling with their own expenses.

Ms. EBERLE-MAYSE. Right.

Senator DURBIN. I have introduced legislation called care givers

insurance. The State of Delaware has already done this. They have

said that, if you work in a child care facility, you qualify for Medicaid in their State; you are covered. I think that ought to be extended beyond child care workers to people working in nursing

homes, personal care attendants for disabled people. Why is it that

we are going to trust members of our family who are disabled, our

parents, and our kids, that we would not want that worker to have

the peace of mind of health insurance coverage. That strikes me as

something that would create an incentive for some to come to this

profession and others to stay.

Ms. EBERLE-MAYSE. Absolutely. I think one of the really difficult

choices that sometimes centers have to make is, do I put this—the

money that I have, do I put it into making my salaries the highest

they can be, so that I can be more competitive, and what has to

give if I do that? Is it health insurance? Is it not as many resources

for the kids? But one of the things—our highest percent should be

salaries, no question. But there are lots of tough choices that end

up happening for lots of centers relative to salary versus benefits.

Is it money in your pocket, or is it money that is going to insure

your continued health? It is a tough choice.

Senator DURBIN. Senator Carnahan.

Senator CARNAHAN. Thank you. Tell us some more, Lisa. Follow

up with that line of thought some more with the costs of your center and how sometimes you maybe have to cut corners. How do

other child care centers handle this balancing act that you have to

go through every day?

Ms. EBERLE-MAYSE. It is a balancing act. And really the two pivots of the balance are staff salaries and fees. Every year, we have

14

usually a fairly minimal fee increase. But every year, we struggle

over exactly how much that is going to be, because the higher our

tuition gets, the less likely we are to be able—as you talked about

with Zelda—to be able to really maintain that amount of diversity

that we have always had at Childgarden. We also know that we

have to be competitive in terms of, at least within our field, the salaries that we pay our child care staff.

We try to really minimize our non-salary expenses. We shop

cheap. We are fortunate that we have two separate development

departments that do lots of fund-raising for us, both for capital improvements and all the way down to art supplies from girl scout

troops. So we get creative about finding ways to supply our classrooms and the things that we need.

The other thing that we have put a lot of effort into is trying to

make the workplace pleasant and supportive for staff in ways other

than straight salary. That needs to happen too. But in the meantime, what can we do to make this a supportive and welcome place

to work? Do you have places to put your own stuff? Do you have

the opportunity to take classes and somebody is going to pay for

you to do that? So we try to find ways to make it a good place to

be in addition to the salaries that are paid.

Senator CARNAHAN. Do you make use of volunteers? And is that

an effective thing to do?

Ms. EBERLE-MAYSE. Yes, it is. For us, it is a way of getting more

hands on deck. And we participate in the foster grandparents program. We currently have three foster grandparents in our building.

We just had a whole batch of students from SLU High School

leave. They have been with us for a month. They worked with kids,

but did tons of manual labor too, I will tell you what. So yes, we

really try to recruit volunteers.

The catch there is that, in our situation at least, we choose not

to use volunteers to meet our State-mandated ratios, because we

want to be able to have more control over the education, the training, and the performance of those individuals. So we use paid staff

to meet those ratios, and our volunteers to be an extra pair of

hands and to help bring the ratios down a little bit, but not officially. Did that answer your question?

Senator CARNAHAN. Yes, thank you. Steve, you mentioned Philip?

Mr. COK. Right.

Senator CARNAHAN. What did you see as the difference in a welltrained child care worker and one that was not, and how that impacted Philip, for instance?

Mr. COK. I think the ability to bond with the children. It was

clear during drop-off times that he was unhappy at the CEC situation. He did not want to go to the teacher, did not want to be there

at all. Transition times are always difficult for children, but this

continued even on the pick-up. So it was clear that the teachers

were not bonding. The way they talked about it, it was like they

talked about, ‘‘Yeah, he’s having a difficult time. Yeah, it’s difficult.

It’s not working well.’’ What we found when we went to Zelda’s was that there was an

immediate welcoming bonding of the teacher to the child. When

issues came up, there was more discussion about ‘‘Is there anything

going on at home? ’’ ‘‘What could explain this?’’ So they were obviVerDate 11-MAY-2000 12:11 Dec 12, 2002 Jkt 000000 PO 00000 Frm 00018 Fmt 6633 Sfmt 6633 83194.TXT SAFFAIRS PsN: SAFFAIRS
15

ously reaching out, trying to understand the child as well as the

family situation. That kind of quality just shines through. It is

training, I guess, and a desire to be there, rather than just to have

a job.

Senator CARNAHAN. Miss Harris—Aliyah and Keith?

Ms. HARRIS. Yes.

Senator CARNAHAN. What other options would you have had for

them if it had not been for this sliding scale arrangement? What

would you have done?

Ms. HARRIS. Honestly, I have no idea what I would have done.

Actually, I think the only other alternative that my husband and

I would have is to find new jobs. One of us would have had to

switch our job, and one of us would have had to work on a different

shift, so that one of us would have been on a day shift, and someone would have been on a night shift. That would have been the

only other option we had. We both have very little family here, and

the little family that we do have work the same hours that we do,

Monday through Friday. So there is no other help from there. And

we can not just go out and find another job paying a lot more. That

all depends on your qualifications and your education. So that

would have probably been our only other alternative, to work

around each other’s schedule, because I would not have been able

to afford a regular facility, and I am above the income guidelines

to get aid for child care.

Senator CARNAHAN. Janice, how common would you say the experience is that you had? How common is it among your friends, for

instance, having difficulty in meeting some special need? I imagine

you have met others.

Ms. MOENSTER. For most families, it is extremely difficult. Our

son was actually on the waiting list for services. So we were

thrilled when he got in, but then juggling and trying to make the

arrangements to make sure he got those services. And all I kept

thinking, when he was fifteenth on the waiting list, that was 15

kids who went without services because their family could not

make those arrangements. So it is very common.

Senator DURBIN. Thank you very much, Senator Carnahan. Lisa,

let me ask you this question. I think, in Illinois, to be a day care

worker, you have to have an associate’s degree, 2 years of college.

Is it the same requirement in Missouri?

Ms. EBERLE-MAYSE. No. And I am not familiar with what is required in Illinois.

Senator DURBIN. I think that is the case. Does that sound right?

Some say yes and some say no. We will have to check that.

Ms. EBERLE-MAYSE. In the State of Missouri, there are requirements for college credit hours for directors. Accreditation requires

a higher level of education or training for directors on down to assistants in the classroom. But what licensing requires is that——

Senator DURBIN. Ratios?

Ms. EBERLE-MAYSE. Right. But they also require that people

working in child care get 12 clock hours of training every year.

They are getting ready to implement a more mandatory orientation

and a first round of training that providers would get. But my

opinion is that the requirements are fairly minimal in terms of licensing. Programs like ours that are accredited agree to subscribe

16

to a higher level of training. And the baseline for that is typically

a child development associate’s credential or an associate’s degree.

I will tell you, though, that one of the things that we do, addressing the issue of having a place to go, having a lattice or a ladder

that you can go up, we have people come work in our facility that

we know have good practice, have good instincts with kids, have

some training and education. And then we try really hard to grow

those people. We invest money in training for them or school. We

try to find scholarships and other kinds of things that we can do

to help move them up the ladder. And there are salary increases

that are attached to those higher levels of education. It is one of

the things that came about because of the joint venture between

Easter Seals and ARC.

Senator DURBIN. What kind of turnover rates do you find in the

industry or in your facility?

Ms. EBERLE-MAYSE. In our facility, we are fortunate. Ours are

pretty low. Last year, ours was right around 18 percent, which is

pretty low.

Senator CARNAHAN. What do you attribute that to?

Ms. EBERLE-MAYSE. The turnover?

Senator CARNAHAN. Is it money?

Ms. EBERLE-MAYSE. Yes, I think it is. And, actually, most of the

people that we lost—that sounds like a terrible thing to say—were

folks that were sort of trying out this business. And it is hard

work. There are people that will come and start working as a sub

or a volunteer, and they realize that they are going home exhausted every night, and they are not making much money. I think

it is one of the reasons why the people that tend to stay are folks

that look at what we do as a mission, quite frankly, that they see

the importance of it.

What is frankly criminal, however, is that the care of kids, and

especially quality care, is actually being subsidized by substandard

wages and by parents struggling to pay the fees.

Senator DURBIN. Steve, what is your experience at Zelda’s with

the people working there, the turnover rates?

Mr. COK. Well, I think Zelda’s is much like this day care here,

where they have a director who is very much interested in training

and promoting child care as a career. And so rarely do they lose

teachers due to unhappy environments. The majority probably

moved on into the public education system for higher wages. And

occasionally, people—this is just too much work for this kind of

money. They can find better ways to make a living.

Senator DURBIN. Do you know what your turnover rate was last

year?

Mr. COK. Last year, I do not know the exact percentages. It was

probably 20 percent. And I do not know how the director ever finds

replacements, but she always manages to come through and find

qualified people.

Senator DURBIN. Great. Thank you all very much. I want to

thank the first panel: Janice, Jo Ann, Steve, and Lisa.

I invite our second panel of witnesses to please come forward: Teresa Jenkins, Director of the Office of Workforce Relations for the

U.S. Office of Personnel Management in Washington, DC. Sarah

Kirschner, from Missouri Childcare at Work. Penny Korte; she is

17

1The prepared statement of Ms. Jenkins appears in the Appendix on page 43.

with PALS of Highland, Illinois, a child care provider. Corinne Patton, Missouri Childcare Resource & Referral Network. And Kim

Hunt, Illinois Childcare Resource & Referral Network.

Well, Teresa, since you have come the furthest, you are undoubtedly the expert. We welcome you from Washington, DC, Teresa

Jenkins.

TESTIMONY OF TERESA M. JENKINS,1 DIRECTOR, OFFICE OF

WORKFORCE RELATIONS, OFFICE OF PERSONNEL MANAGEMENT

Ms. JENKINS. Thank you, Mr. Chairman and Senator Carnahan.

I appreciate being invited here today to discuss with you the child

care subsidy program within the Federal Government.

On November 12, 2001, President George W. Bush signed the

Treasury and General Government Appropriations Act of 2002,

which permanently authorizes executive agencies to use appropriated funds otherwise available for salaries and expenses to provide child care in a Federal or leased facility or through contract

for civilian employees. And as you mentioned, Senator Carnahan,

you introduced this important legislation.

Amounts provided are to improve the affordability of child care

for lower income employees. The legislation covers the children of

Federal employees from birth through age 13 and disabled children

through the age of 18. Congress previously provided the authorization to Federal agencies as a pilot project.

An increasing number of Federal employees are discovering that

affordable child care is getting more difficult to find, even when

their own agencies sponsor on- or near-site child care centers. The

affordability of child care for lower income employees remains out

of reach as child care costs can translate to as much as 50 percent

of total family income.

Reduced child care tuition as a result of agency contributions

permitted by law can have a significant impact on employees’ ability to utilize safe and reliable child care. Benefits to the agencies

include improved recruitment and retention of qualified personnel,

lower absenteeism rates, as well as improved morale. Improved retention also results in significant recruitment and training cost

savings to Federal agencies. And, of course, employee productivity

is increased due to the reduced concern about child care.

The Office of Personnel Management’s regulations to establish a

child care subsidy program provide Federal agencies with maximum flexibility to define lower income Federal employees and determine the size of the subsidy each employee receives, as agencies

have different needs.

The Office of Personnel Management provides agencies with

models for determining employee eligibility and the amount of the

tuition assistance subsidy. There is no cap on the percentage of

child care tuition that will be subsidized.

Twenty-three agencies currently offer a child care tuition assistance program for their employees. The use of the program by Federal employees has increased significantly over the years, as has

the amount of funds the agencies dedicate for this purpose. The

18

1The prepared statement of Ms. Kirschner appears in the Appendix on page 52.

number of Federal employees utilizing the child care subsidy has

also risen significantly since the inception of this program. Initially, 205 lower income Federal employees received tuition assistance, supporting 253 children. During the year 2000, the number

of Federal employees grew to more than 800, supporting 1,033 children.

Federal employees at pay grade levels GS–1 through GS–13 received child care tuition assistance. But the majority of Federal employees receiving child care assistance is between GS–4 and GS– 7, which equates to an average salary between $20,000 and

$37,000 annually.

The subsidy program allows Federal employees to use centerbased child care, as well as care in family child care homes, as long

as they are licensed or regulated by the State or local regulating

authorities. Our studies show that the majority of children are enrolled in child care centers versus family child care homes.

The Office of Personnel Management is committed to supporting

Federal programs that assist employees who are caring for children, as well as providing work and family flexibilities that help

to balance these responsibilities.

Although initial numbers of Federal employees utilizing the program were low, interest and participation grew rapidly. Agencies

raised the eligibility threshold to allow for maximum utilization

and used multiple and continuous marketing strategies to educate

and encourage employees to utilize the program.

During the pilot phase of the program, when the legislation was

temporary, the Office of Personnel Management received comments

from both agencies and employees stating their interest in implementing and using the program, but fearing the program would not

be made permanent. Now that permanent legislation has been enacted—thanks in large part to you, Senator Carnahan—OPM expects a significant increase in agency and Federal employee utilization.

Additionally, in past years, the pilots were implemented at a

time of year normally difficult for parents to change child care arrangements. With permanent legislation, employees can take the

time to secure quality child care at more convenient times throughout the year.

This concludes my testimony. Thank you for inviting me here to

be with you today, and I will be happy to respond to any questions.

Senator DURBIN. Thanks, Ms. Jenkins. Sarah Kirschner.

TESTIMONY OF SARAH KIRSCHNER,1 MISSOURI CHILDCARE

AT WORK

Ms. KIRSCHNER. Thank you, Mr. Chairman and Senator

Carnahan, for the opportunity to discuss child care with you today.

I will be focusing on what businesses do and how they are impacted by child care issues in the community and the workforces

in which they operate.

Approximately 10 percent of a large, diverse workforce has children under age six. Of the St. Louis area labor force, 24.5 percent

of workers have children under age 15. Employers are impacted

19

every day by the children who are in unsafe or unregulated care,

by the hundreds of school-age children left home alone, by the low

wages paid to child care workers, and by the lack of funding for

infant care.

Some companies recognize the impact, but many do not. Yet employers are the biggest indirect consumer of child care because it

is working parents who require child care, and it is those children

now in care who are the future labor force.

The private sector, including companies and philanthropic organizations, contributes only about 1 percent of the total spent on

child care in this country. Because child care is funded primarily

by parent fees, there is always a gap between what parents can afford and what it actually costs to run a program. When an employer sponsors a child care center, the company typically provides

20 to 40 percent of the annual operating budget.

Missouri Childcare at Work was a unique project undertaken by

Fred Epstein, a St. Louis business owner, and operator of Zelda’s

that we heard about earlier, an on-site child care center at his

plant, and then-Missouri First Lady Jean Carnahan. It was a

project to encourage businesses to consider on-site child care for

their employees. Over the course of the project, about 300 people

around the State attended meetings and listened to Mrs. Carnahan

and Mr. Epstein.

Two things made this project unique and valuable: The willingness of two visible people outside the child care field to speak out

about the issue and capitalizing on Fred’s business perspective and

Mrs. Carnahan’s knowledge of early childhood education, and the

availability of funding to offer technical assistance to projects as

they started out. Even with corporate dollars pledged to support a

center, the staffs at these companies are not child care experts, and

they have their own full-time job to do. Starting a project requires

extensive research and legwork before anything can happen. In

Missouri, there are limited start-up funds available for any child

care programs, including those with employer sponsors, and few, if

any, dollars for planning and community resource assessments that

should also be done.

Over the past 10 or 15 years, some employers have come to realize that child care is not as far removed from their lives as they

once thought, and it impacts the entire workforce, not just those

with children. The benefits of offering some type of child care program to workers are many. The obvious is that stable quality child

care settings translate to fewer breakdowns and emergencies, fewer

frantic phone calls during the workday, and fewer last-minute absences because the sitter called in sick.

Many companies have documented other gains. At a small manufacturing company in Rolla, Missouri, there are 4 of the 25 workers

who are absolutely essential to plant production. All four currently

use child care. And if just one of them is out for the day, the company loss is about $5,000 for that day. That loss affects the entire

workforce, and it affects the bottom line.

NationsBank estimated that, by using a child care resource and

referral service, their employees save 12 to 15 work hours looking

for child care.

20

Although on-site child care is widely publicized and visible, it is

very expensive. It may only serve a portion of the workforce, and

it requires a long-term financial commitment. Fortunately, there

are other options available to employers. Offering information on

parenting or family care during work hours is one of the easiest,

cheapest things an employer can do. Resource and referral is another low-cost option. These services match parents with care that

meets their needs.

There are two types of resource and referral services. There are

the not-for-profit, usually State-funded, community-based agencies,

and there are for-profit vendors who buy databases of child care

providers and sell them to companies. Both can offer lists to parents. But what the for-profits do not do is improve and expand the

supply of child care in the community by training, recruitment, and

so forth. This is an important distinction not often recognized by

employers.

Other options that employers consider are family leaves and

other personnel policies, especially sick time and parental leaves,

flexible work schedules, pre-tax savings plans, direct financial assistance to help pay for care, direct community support of scholarships, training opportunities, and other initiatives.

Each option has costs and advantages and disadvantages. For a

company with a young, primarily female workforce, the cost of an

on-site center may be outweighed by the reduction of turnover

costs. For an older, more stable workforce, offering information and

referrals may be the best approach. And for a company that values

their image as a corporate citizen, contributing to local child care

improvement efforts may be the right approach.

In the St. Louis area, there are many examples of companies who

support child care and families. Brown Shoe Company has extensive scheduling flexibility. Washington University and Blue Cross/

Blue Shield offer child and elder care resource and referral services. Twelve area hospitals or nursing homes have on-site child

care centers, as do Monsanto, Ralston-Purina, and INDEECO.

IBM, AT&T, Citicorp, and UAW-Ford have all directed money to

the St. Louis region to improve child care and to recruit and train

providers. And Bank of America provides a direct subsidy to low

wage workers to help pay for care.

My recommendations for how the Federal Government can promote affordable, quality child care are to continue to offer tax credits and other direct incentives to employers who commit resources

to child care in their own workforces and in the community; to continue to offer information and resources through the Department of

Labor Women’s Bureau and other avenues; to offer start-up, expansion, and enhancement funds so that new programs can get started

and existing programs can expand and improve; to support the national system of community-based resource and referral agencies

who are in the field every day, working with employers, providers,

and parents to build a better child care system; and to recognize

and encourage others to recognize that learning begins at birth and

that child care includes everything from infant care to programs for

school-age children during summers, holidays, before and after

school.

Thank you again for your interest.

21

1The prepared statement of Ms. Korte appears in the Appendix on page 56.

Senator DURBIN. Thank you very much. Penny Korte, from Highland, Illinois.

TESTIMONY OF PENNY KORTE,1 DAYCARE OWNER/DIRECTOR,

P.A.L.S., HIGHLAND, ILLINOIS

Ms. KORTE. Thank you. My name is Penny Korte, and I own and

operate a small day care center in Highland, Illinois, which I started on my own 12 years ago February 27 of this year.

As most of you here are well aware that a myriad of issues face

child care professionals on a constant basis, it is my belief that the

lack of respect given to my colleagues sparks most of these concerns. This lack of respect is then heightened as the many programs that are continually in focus of the media are negative when

it comes to day care or pertain to the public or private sector of

education for grades K through 12. Before children enter what

most consider their formal education settings, the voice of many

consider that children only need a babysitter to tend to their needs.

But anyone that is familiar with the education system now understands that this is not the case anymore.

I would be remiss to include everyone in that thought. However,

those not in day care can not really ascertain what is involved. In

Illinois and Missouri, day care centers are to be licensed and follow

a set of guidelines that require knowledge of legal reading. We

have to be educated in developmental issues, both physical and

mental, be able to care for and teach at a variety of age levels,

know medical symptoms, and be trained in first aid and CPR, complete a food preparation class, along with the knowledge of health

safety issues in general, know how to recognize signs of abuse and

report when necessary, nurture and encourage each child, yet second-guess every touch we give to protect ourselves from the many

liabilities now forced on our profession.

We take care of children from 6 weeks to 12 years for sometimes

11 hours or more a day. Even though we ourselves may not work

the entire time, we end up spending more awake time with many

of these children than their parents. At the same time, we are expected to react, protect, and educate four, five, eight, or ten children to one worker, depending on their ages. This emotional stress

in itself of reacting or trying to prevent chaotic situations is one

that I am sure many of you here today would agree is not where

you might want to be.

Yet my workers and those others in day care do this exact job

Monday through Friday, more depending on the center hours, 52

weeks of the year. And that in itself is an issue that everyone

faces: Scheduling. How long should you be open, how many hours

a day, what types of care do you provide.

With a job description like that and the stress it entails, you

might think the salary would be equal to that of a teacher. Wrong.

In my town, employees are paid anywhere from $6 to $9 an hour,

with the average being right around $7.50. This would make your

annual income $15,600, and who can survive on that? Many times,

these workers have children of their own too, and that cuts right

into the already low figure that they are trying to live on. My curVerDate 11-MAY-2000 12:11 Dec 12, 2002 Jkt 000000 PO 00000 Frm 00025 Fmt 6633 Sfmt 6633 83194.TXT SAFFAIRS PsN: SAFFAIRS
22

rent average pay is right at $6.25 an hour for my teachers. But I

have other issues that I face myself.

Recommendations I come to you with today are as follows:

Make Federal money more easily accessible and acquirable to assist States for retention and continued education in day care for

such programs such as Great START and T.E.A.C.H. in Illinois.

Look into ways to fund programs that would also help in attaining health care and retirement benefits for job stability and continued education, somewhat similar to what K through 12 teachers

have. You choose child care for your life because you believe in

what kids need and love children, not to get rich. That does not

mean, however, you should remain at the poverty level all of your

life. But you are pretty much guaranteed no retirement money if

you can only barely survive on what you receive now.

I would also suggest offsetting what the parents pay with increased tax benefits. This would make them more willing to pay

the prices that we have to ask.

When children are in school, they are being taken care of for

their parents too. Yet they are being taught English, math, etc. But

what we teach is how to learn, how to get along, and how to succeed. And though some would argue that teachers have a 4-year

degree, I would counter with the question, how many of you would

pay $6,000 to $8,000 for 4 years to enter a profession that pays

back yearly less than $20,000 in most cases? Is there some way

that the Federal Government could give State money back to offset

real estate taxes already being paid to create some type of funding

similar to that of public schooling? I am not asking for more taxes.

Nobody would.

I know that I am considered a for-profit independent center, but

I am not sure why. I am still regulated by a government agency,

and I would like to know what kind of profit is in my $17,000-ayear salary myself.

My last request would be that the coverage given day care be

more positive, or at least more in-depth. I would like to say that

it is easy to get caught in the guidelines and requirements set forth

by many agencies overseeing day cares. Many times, those who set

up the rules have never even set foot or worked in a real center.

Or maybe they have been in a pilot program, and that is great.

It is easy to see how, in meeting the requirements of hiring an

education-qualified individual, you might be ignoring a more experienced candidate who would naturally have been able to recognize

the needs of that infant who is now in the hospital from being

shook by your newly-hired 4-year-degree employee.

I would like to congratulate Illinois on what steps they have

taken to create some assistance for day care workers. I am not as

familiar with that for Missouri; I am sorry. I would like to see more

input from those people actually hands-on, however, versus those

in offices, reading manuals and making up the rules and guidelines. Maybe more paperwork and rules are not what is necessary.

Maybe just the right paperwork. Then we might all have more time

to do our job better.

To briefly summarize my key points, day care workers deserve

the respect and compensations due them for their job description;

Federal help would best be sought through funds or more funds to

23

1The prepared statement of Ms. Patton appears in the Appendix on page 58.

assist in retention and furthering education of workers, benefit programs for health care and retirement, bigger tax breaks for parents; and people in the field should be helping to make those guidelines.

Thank you very much.

Senator DURBIN. Thank you very much. Corinne Patton.

TESTIMONY OF CORINNE PATTON,1 MANAGER, MISSOURI

CHILD CARE RESOURCE AND REFERRAL NETWORK

Ms. PATTON. Senator Durbin, Senator Carnahan, thank you for

holding these field hearings today, and thank you for choosing

‘‘Good beginnings last a lifetime’’ as the title of the hearing. I believe good beginnings, indeed, last a lifetime, and I am proud to be

part of an organization that helps families make their own good beginnings.

I represent the Missouri Child Care Resource and Referral Network. Our agency coordinates the activities of the eight Child Care

Resource and Referral Agencies that serve Missouri, CCR&R’s for

short. Each independent nonprofit agency serves a designated portion of Missouri’s 115 counties. The Network manages contracts between the State agencies and local CCR&R’s and handles several

special child care related projects.

Child care resource and referral agencies provide a number of

services and special activities. And we have lots of printed materials outside in the hall. I hope you and the audience will take

some.

Finding, deciding on, and beginning to use child care becomes

one of the earliest and least supported challenges for the working

parent. CCR&R agencies support families in their search for child

care. Each local agency maintains a database of child care providers and the pertinent information about their services. Referral

specialists at each local CCR&R share that information with families in telephone interviews and through mail, fax, and E-mail

daily.

Last year, our eight agencies served over 20,000 families who

were seeking care for more than 28,000 children. This is the referral part of resource and referral. These families received a list of

referrals to help them narrow their search in finding the best child

care provider for their child. Each caller also received printed consumer education material that offered points to consider in making

the choice and questions to pose to prospective providers.

For example, we recommend that a family consider the child’s

point of view and the kind of people and activities that will make

the child comfortable. A child may wonder, who will care for me,

are there plenty of toys that I can reach and enjoy, where will I

keep my stuff, is everyone having fun, what will I do all day.

The right child care provider will develop a positive, loving relationship with the child. This is a key indicator of quality care. The

right care giver will also relate well to the parent and have values

and attitudes that are similar to those of the family. Parents, and

especially parents who are placing an infant and toddler, should

watch the provider interact with children and consider these

24

issues. Are children happy and involved? Does the provider seem

warm and friendly? Is she or he calm and patient with the children? Does the provider listen to the children? Does the provider

talk to them and encourage them to express themselves? And does

the care giver have special training or credentials?

Making a smart child care choice involves visits to several programs to compare and observe the program and the physical setting, as well as interviews with providers. The consumer education

material that CCR&R’s offer to every family puts the questions together in a concise package and details ways to continue to monitor

the child’s successful adjustment to child care.

Families with children with special needs receive enhanced services from Missouri CCR&R’s. Each local agency has an inclusion

specialist on staff that works to help families find inclusive child

care. This means that children with special needs are placed in

program with typically-developing children. The inclusion specialist

also offers services to providers to ensure that they have the training and skills necessary to serve the children.

CCR&R’s offer families help in navigating Missouri’s child care

regulatory system. The agencies can define terms such as licensed,

license-exempt, unregulated, and accredited. The agencies refer

parents to the Bureau of Child Care offices in the Department of

Health and Senior Services for additional information and access to

public licensing records.

Our agencies also offer services to child care providers, the community, and to employers. Last year, our agencies provided almost

36,000 technical assistance contacts to child care providers. We offered over 9,000 technical assistance contacts to parents, 1,200

technical assistance contacts to employers, and over 12,000 technical assistance contacts to other people in the community who

needed information such as things related to supply and demand

data. And our local agencies mailed 162,000 child care-related publications.

All the activities detailed above make up the resource part of resource and referral. The Network and the local agencies compile,

analyze, and share information about child care. Our agencies develop and maintain databases by collecting detailed information

about the supply of child care, the availability of subsidies, and

other valuable community resources for families.

We are acutely aware of the special hardships that low income

Missouri families face when they seek affordable quality child care.

Missouri may not have a waiting list for subsidized child care, but

that is only because the subsidy eligibility is so restricted that very

few families qualify. Missouri ranks at the bottom of the 50 States

in our eligibility for child care subsidy.

Child Care in the Workplace is the Missouri network’s toolkit for

employers interested in developing family-friendly workplace policies. This material was written so that employers can consider the

full array of options available to them. As Sarah Kirschner indicated, there are many different kinds of options, such as seminars,

leave policies, scheduling policies, financial assistance, support for

community-based child care programs, and on-site and near-site

child care centers. What our CCR&R’s do not have right now are

25

the staffing resources to dedicate themselves to really working on

employer initiatives.

We sit on many community boards, partnerships, and initiatives.

We collaborate with community partners and encourage efforts to

improve and shape services. Community-based CCR&R’s have a

big-picture perspective combined with good local information. We

exam systemic problems, identify barriers, and link other partners

in finding solutions. We know that these solutions require the involvement of all sectors and segments of the community if we are

to be successful in offering families that good beginning.

The Network coordinates several special initiatives involving

training, offering family child care providers an entrepreneurial or

business aspect to their program, coordinating Heads Up reading

literacy training, and offering consultation services to child care

programs working toward accreditation.

You have heard about T.E.A.C.H., mentioned before. We also

manage the T.E.A.C.H. Early Childhood Program in Missouri.

T.E.A.C.H. stands for teacher education and compensation helps.

Missouri and Illinois are two of 19 States participating in this national initiative to increase education and compensation and reduce

turnover in the child care workforce. Presently in Missouri, there

are almost 100 early childhood teachers taking college courses

through funds provided by T.E.A.C.H.. Each teacher receives either

a raise or bonus from her or his employer at the end of a 1-year

contract, and in return, agrees to remain employed at their sponsoring program. We hope that eventually our child care workforce

will make more than those parking lot attendants.

The Network and local CCR&R’s are also members of

NACCRRA, the National Association of Child Care Resource and

Referral Agencies. NACCRRA represents almost 700 communitybased CCR&R’s from every State in the country. NACCRRA provides us with vision, leadership, and support, and promotes

national policies and partnerships committed to learning and development of all children.

While the demands for services from families, providers, and

communities increase every year, our funding from our State contract does not. As Missouri struggles with its budget shortfall, core

service funding to the Network, and subsequently to the local

CCR&R’s, was cut by 15 percent in the current fiscal year. This

has resulted in the inevitable decrease in availability of some services.

Funding a system of CCR&R services in each State with an entity such as the Network to coordinate and support services would

ensure that child care resource and referral activities continue to

reach families, child care providers, employers, and other community partners in that they collect and disseminate the data that

leads to sound decision making. Language in the proposed reauthorization of the Child Care and Development Fund supports an

earmarked funding for such a system, and that would help ensure

that these services continue to be available for Missouri families

and communities. And I ask that you support that language.

Tomorrow is Child Advocacy Day in Missouri, and I thank you

for the opportunity to get a little jump on being an advocate today.

26

1The prepared statement of Ms. Hunt appears in the Appendix on page 62.

Senator DURBIN. Thank you very much. And our last witness on

this panel, Kim Hunt.

TESTIMONY OF KIM E. HUNT,1 ILLINOIS NETWORK OF CHILD

CARE RESOURCE AND REFERRAL AGENCIES (INCCRRA)

Ms. HUNT. Thank you, Senator Durbin and Senator Carnahan,

for the opportunity to address you this morning on behalf of child

care providers. I will be addressing the services of the Illinois Network of Child Care Resource and Referral Agencies (INCCRRA)

and how the services support child care providers and quality child

care in Illinois.

INCCRRA is an organization of 17 regional child care resource

and referral agencies, R&R’s, working together to improve access

to high-quality child care in communities throughout Illinois.

INCCRRA maintains the most comprehensive data on child care

supply, child care program characteristics, and factors that influence a parent’s choice of child care. The State network and local

partners are currently involved in a number of initiatives that address the availability of quality services for children and families.

One initiative is a part of First Lady Lura Lynn Ryan’s Futures for

Kids program, Quality Counts.

INCCRRA administers several programs that are coordinated

through individual R&R’s. They are:

The T.E.A.C.H. project, started in 1996 with 35 participants. The

program currently serves over 1,200 recipients working in 81 counties. The program has assisted 39 current providers in completing

their degree. T.E.A.C.H. has effectively reduced the turnover rate

to 6 percent for participants, compared to an annual turnover rate

of 15 percent for child care teachers and 24 percent for assistant

teachers.

Professional development funds provide providers with the opportunity to attend activities that include college tuition, attendance

in conferences, and credentialing programs. In the fiscal year 2001,

providers completed 918 semester hours of college credit. An additional 4,868 providers completed training that applied towards

credentialing and in-service hours.

Gov. Ryan signed Great START, a wage supplement program for

early childhood providers, into law in May 2000. Implemented in

March 2001, there are currently 2,500 participants receiving an average wage supplement of $1,700 per year. For participants renewing their applications, the rate of attrition from the field was 7 percent.

The Illinois Network for Educational Development is the beginning of a training tracking system. The system tracks Great

START participants and their educational achievements, including

credentials, degrees, and course work.

Illinois Child Care is an AmeriCorps program to enhance R&R

services and build literacy skills in young children, 185 members

have served within the R&R system since 1994, earning educational awards and valuable experience.

The Illinois Trainer Network is a statewide training approval

program that supports and compensates skilled trainers who deVerDate 11-MAY-2000 12:11 Dec 12, 2002 Jkt 000000 PO 00000 Frm 00030 Fmt 6633 Sfmt 6633 83194.TXT SAFFAIRS PsN: SAFFAIRS
27

liver high quality and accessible training to providers. Over 350

certified trainers conduct 6 to 32 hour trainings in 10 topic areas

for 3,900 providers.

Quality Counts Child Care Grants were implemented in January

of this year to improve and expand early care and education services, $1.5 million has been allocated, with $.5 million targeted for

programs that serve infants and toddlers. Grants are awarded for

equipment, materials, projects that improve quality or maintain

space for infants and toddlers. These funds are also available to license-exempt or relative care providers.

The statewide R&R training activities are delivered in many

forms to respond to the diverse training needs of the child care professionals. Training workshops are the most common methods, followed by conferences. The use of self-study materials has steadily

increased since 1996—37,000-plus child care professionals attended

2,339 workshops statewide, while 58 conferences were sponsored

and 895 child care professionals used self-study materials.

Comments that I have heard from the field:

‘‘Through Great START, a staff person was able to increase her

salary by $1.90 per hour.’’

‘‘New directors receive their training on the job, and not necessarily through college courses. These funds enabled me to get additional training and support through more non-traditional methods such as conferences and intense seminars.’’

And you can hear them in the halls: ‘‘I got my check from Great

START today.’’

For the past 2 years, Illinois has been recognized as one of the

top 10 States to have made a difference in who is caring for kids.

It is our hope that Illinois remains in the top 10 by continuing to

be a role model for other States, maintaining and enhancing existing programs, and developing new and innovative initiatives.

Thank you for today and your future successes to champion the

welfare of children and families.

Senator DURBIN. Thank you very much. Senator Carnahan,

would you like to ask the first round of questions.

Senator CARNAHAN. Well, thank you for being a very interesting

and informative panel. We will start here with Teresa. Based on

the experiences that you have had at OPM in setting up the Federal Employees Child Care Assistance Program, what kind of advice would you give to employers who want to do this? Or even to

State and local entities?

Ms. JENKINS. Well, to follow up on something that the previous

panel member, Janice, was talking about as far as workplace flexibilities, I think that that is absolutely important. And I am sure

you know the Federal Government has been a leader in the use of

alternative work schedules for Federal employees for many years.

That allows Federal employees to vary their work week as well as

vary the time at which they report to work. And that allows them

to take care of family needs.

Also, a relatively recent piece of legislation is the Family and

Medical Leave Act, which also provides Federal employees with

more options to take care of their child care needs. And as I am

sure you know, Congressman Wolf and Congressman Hoyer are

28

very much pressing telework within the Federal Government. And

it too, I believe, can have a benefit.

Again following up on something that Janice was saying, where

Janice has a very unique and specific child care need, if employees

are allowed to either work from home or from the office, it perhaps

can open opportunities for selecting the appropriate child care center. So I think the workplace flexibilities are absolutely critical, the

leave that employees are allowed to take, as well as part-time employment. Just a multitude of flexibilities to allow employees to

balance the work and family responsibilities.

Senator CARNAHAN. Thank you.

Sarah, what would cause a business or employer to decide to

have on-site care or provide care for their employees? And how can

we encourage them to do this? What factors come into play here?

Ms. KIRSCHNER. That is an interesting question. I think there

are two common ways. One is truly a bottom-up kind of a grass

roots, where a company keeps hearing this issue over and over and

over, and someone at the top is listening, and over a time of hearing that—child care, child care, child care—begins to be willing to

look at some options, and in the end may decide on on-site child

care or some other option.

The other way that this happens, I think, is the opposite. It is

the top down, where the person at the top says, ‘‘This is important

to me.’’ And typically it is because of something that has happened

to them. Senator Durbin mentioned his grandchildren, and you will

often hear that the president of a company, it did not click until

his daughter went to work, and suddenly, ‘‘We have to have child

care.’’

So I think it comes from both ways.

Senator DURBIN. That sounds familiar.

Ms. KIRSCHNER. What we can do to encourage that, I think, is

something that we have mentioned. And that is to continue to talk

about the success stories, to continue to offer some incentives. The

tax reform of last year does have a tax credit for employers that

own and operate on-site child care centers or that use resource and

referrals. So I think those are steps in the right direction, to continue to incent those efforts as well.

Senator CARNAHAN. Thank you.

Penny, what would you say is the single most important thing

that we could do to encourage people to choose child care as a profession?

Ms. KORTE. That is an even better question. To make it more attractive. You can not make people choose. They have to have a love

of working with children, because I have had people come to me

that have thought that child care was an easy profession to be in.

And they found out very quickly it is not an easy profession.

However, to provide more funding for the Great START program,

or just in general, health benefits and those types of things. I think

that, to make it more attractive, we have to be able to compensate

them for what they do.

And that, I feel, is one of the biggest problems that there is, because, as many of us know, and it has been mentioned numerous

times today, when you are competing with parking lots, where you

do not have to think on the job and the stress is very minimal,

29

compared to what you have to do on a daily basis in a child care

setting, you want some compensation for that. You do not want to

go home and feel like you have not only spent 8 or 9 hours, whatever your daily schedule is, working and stressing and emotionally

burned out, but then to come home from that and feel like you

have gotten nothing for it, it is not worth people’s while.

Senator CARNAHAN. How would you say, Corinne, that the

T.E.A.C.H. program has benefitted the staff members that you

know who have participated in it?

Ms. PATTON. Thank you. T.E.A.C.H. has had a wonderful impact,

and we are in our baby steps compared with our colleagues in Illinois. T.E.A.C.H. is relatively new to Missouri. But I have had the

privilege to speak with providers, early childhood teachers, who are

going to school, whose tuition and books are being taken care of.

And the feeling of support and professionalism, it is wonderful to

hear. I think that they are feeling that this is giving them the recognition that this is a valuable profession. It is not babysitting; it

is a serious and valuable profession. And supporting them in getting the opportunity to earn a decent wage and to be compensated

and recognized for their learning and for the work that they put

into it every day. It is such a tremendous job, and that is such a

tremendous responsibility that they take on. But we have got to

support these folks. And we can not do it on the backs of parents.

There is no way we can charge parents the true cost of high-quality

care.

Senator CARNAHAN. It is a morale booster then?

Ms. PATTON. It is. It definitely is.

Senator CARNAHAN. Kim, what would you say is the most frequently asked question by parents who seek your services?

Ms. HUNT. By parents that are seeking referral services for child

care?

Senator CARNAHAN. Yes.

Ms. HUNT. They are looking for that list of people who have vacancies. When we give them a list of providers, they want to know,

‘‘Am I going to find a program that has a vacancy?’’ Senator CARNAHAN. Are they thinking quality? Are they thinking

cost? Or some combination?

Ms. HUNT. Right now, it is a vacancy issue. And then it is can

I afford it, is it a place that I want my child to stay. It is a little

bit of everything. But most cases right now in our areas, we are

looking at vacancy issues, that there are not spaces available for

infants and toddlers. And school-age care. There is a big demand

in Illinois for school-age care. There are not enough programs to

serve the needs.

Senator CARNAHAN. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

Senator DURBIN. Thanks, Senator.

Let me give a jump-ball question here. I would like to know if

any of you could comment on the impact of two things that we are

facing as a country. One is the recession, with eight million people

unemployed. What impact has this had on your workforce, the

number of people who are using child care, and the participation

of businesses in child care? And the second one is welfare-to-work.

We are about to reach a limit here, 5 years, of people on welfare

benefits. And I am wondering what impact this is going to have on

30

some of your workers and whether any of you have people who

were once on welfare that you know of, working in a child care setting, and perhaps you can tell us for the sake of this hearing what

your experience has been with this transition. I will leave that

open to anyone who would feel comfortable with trying to answer

either one of those.

Ms. KIRSCHNER. I will jump in on the recession and participation

of businesses question. I do not know that we have seen yet what

the recession is going to do, how that will impact employers in

whether they are going to be involved in child care.

I guess what I would tell you is that good times did not cause

them to just jump right in either. So I think employers are very

reluctant to get involved in this issue, and with some good reasons

certainly. But they, I think, mostly still see it as, ‘‘This is not my

problem, and I am not going to walk into this.’’ And so I think, as

I said, we did not see everybody jumping in with both feet during

good times, so I can only imagine that that would continue during

bad times.

Senator DURBIN. And what has been the impact of the recession;

can anybody say?

Ms. PATTON. I would say that, strangely enough, the hard economic times brings more folks into the child care workforce, because those jobs are available and people are desperate for them.

When the economy was very good, it was absolutely impossible

to find a child care worker. So that is a rather bizarre turn. But

because these jobs are not well paid, and there are often not many

benefits, and it is difficult work, if folks can find a better-paying

job somewhere else, they will take it. So that is an impact that I

think we will see if this continues.

With respect to welfare-to-work, I think that one of the real

tough issues are folks who have left welfare, who have gotten modest paying jobs, and who need some help. They need a transitional

period when they leave subsidy. You can not go from having your

child care fees fully paid, and you get a dime-an-hour raise, and

you have to pay them all yourself. That just does not work. We

could not do that either if it came to us.

So what we are not providing people is that gradual transition

where they pay more and more, and eventually they pay it all, as

their economic situation improves. We can not cut folks off, because

then you have got people saying, ‘‘No, do not give me the raise; I

can not afford to take that raise. I can not afford to get a promotion; I will lose everything.’’ That is a crazy situation that we

have set up.

Senator DURBIN. I wonder who dreamed this up. Could have

been Congress. We had better be careful.

Any other reactions on those two issues, on the recession?

Penny?

Ms. KORTE. Personally, as a day care owner, we have lost 8 percent of our enrollment.

Senator DURBIN. Eight?

Ms. KORTE. Due to the recession, because we have had local businesses that have laid off staff or switched their hours from first

shift to third shift or first shift to second shift. So now there are

31

parents home, boyfriends at home, or whatever, that they do not

need the day care during the day and that kind of thing.

The welfare has not really hit me too much other than there are

a lot more people putting in applications to come and apply for

jobs. It has not changed the quality or the qualifiedness of that individual per se. I have many, many of the aide applicants, but not

many teacher applicants. So if I lose a teacher, I am still not gaining anything by that. But I do not have any staff that is ready to

leave looking for better-paying jobs right now, because there are

not many out there to find.

Senator DURBIN. I asked the question earlier. Does Illinois require an associate’s degree for direct aide workers?

Ms. KORTE. For the teacher-qualified individual, you have to

have 2 years of education credit. You do not have to have an actual

associate’s degree. You can also substance that through 1 year of

work experience, full-time work experience, with 1 year of education, but you must have six semester hours directly related to

early childhood education.

Senator DURBIN. Teresa, let me ask you. When it comes to the

day care centers for Federal employees, what quality standards do

these centers have to meet?

Ms. JENKINS. Well, regulations and the law governing the subsidy program require that the centers or the homes be licensed

and/or regulated by State or local authorities. So what we require,

then, is the only way that one can have a subsidy provided to them

is if they choose a facility that is licensed or regulated by a State

or local facility.

I can give you an example of a welfare-to-work situation that I

experienced. We had an individual in one of our Federal agencies.

She was a GS–1, a welfare-to-work employee. And she was absolutely thrilled to have the child care subsidy provided to her, because she was using unregulated child care. She left her office

early 1 day to go to the home to pick up her child—she was using

a home-based, unlicensed facility—only to find her child locked in

a closet. So, I think, for the lower income employees, the subsidy

is absolutely critical. And we are finding, within the Federal Government, that the lower the income, the greater the percentage of

the subsidy.

Senator DURBIN. Both Illinois and Missouri must have some sort

of life safety code, or they must be subject to inspection, I take it,

for the facilities to meet certain qualifications. I look at this wonderful place with all of the things. That is the case in Missouri as

well as Illinois, I am sure; is it not?

Ms. PATTON. It is, with the exception that there are numerous

loopholes in Missouri licensing laws that exempt certain kinds of

programs from being fully licensed. Church-based programs are inspected for fire safety and health, but not fully licensed. So that

means staff-child ratio, director qualifications, teacher qualifications, guidance and discipline do not fall under the regulation. And

there are numerous other regulatory loopholes in Missouri.

Senator DURBIN. The reason I asked that, following up on Teresa’s comment, was that we may soon face the debate on the faithbased initiatives, and the question as to whether or not certain

standards applied to everyone else will apply to these new initiaVerDate 11-MAY-2000 12:11 Dec 12, 2002 Jkt 000000 PO 00000 Frm 00035 Fmt 6633 Sfmt 6633 83194.TXT SAFFAIRS PsN: SAFFAIRS
32

tives. And, I think, in many instances, at a minimum, we need to

have parents notified that different standards are going to be used,

and let them know that going in. At a minimum. There could be

argument made that there should not be any variance on some

very basic life safety questions when it comes to schools or day care

centers. But we will save that debate for another hearing. Jean, do

you have any other questions?

Senator CARNAHAN. No.

Senator DURBIN. Well, I want to thank this panel very much.

And I would like to thank the first panel and everyone who attended this hearing today.

I would just say in closing that it is amazing to me that an issue

as broad as this, that affects so many people, has not become a

major national cause. When you take a look at where our country

is headed and what families want the most, the most that they

want is ‘‘Take care of my kids. Help me. Give me a helping hand.

Make it affordable.’’ And time and again, I think we have all paid

lip service to this at every level of government, and have not followed through on it.

I really go back to a point I made earlier. If you are talking about

the well-being and education of children, stop thinking in the 19th

Century. This is the 21st Century. Families have new needs. Families have new demands. Children have new needs. And we had better be responsive, or we will pay the price for it down the line.

I want to thank all of you, particularly those of you who are directly involved in day care. You do make a sacrifice to make it successful. And the parents who are struggling, we are going to try to

do our best, at least, to give you a helping hand in meeting that

burden so that those happy kids that I see at Childgarden I can

see all across this country.

Jean, if you would like to make a closing statement?

Senator CARNAHAN. Again, thank you, Mr. Chairman, for coming

over and holding this hearing and inviting me to be a part of it.

I thank both of the panels. You have given us great information

and wonderful ideas. And to hear the stories of your strength and

your struggles is an inspiration for us. And we will take what you

have told us back to Washington.

I would also like to thank Lisa for having us here in this wonderful facility. Childgarden is a model, and it is something that we

would like to have in a lot of other places around Missouri and Illinois.

We know that the quality of a child’s interaction in the early

years has a significant impact on their brain development and their

temperament, personality, and their ability to learn. Quality is especially important in a child care setting because children spend so

much of their time there, and you have heard that today already,

some as many as 40 hours or more in a child care setting. So we

as a community need to make it a goal that quality care be available to all of our parents. Good beginnings do last a lifetime, and

we need to make a good beginning the birthright of all our children. Thanks.

Senator DURBIN. Thank you all very much.

[Whereupon, at 11:48 a.m., the Subcommittee was adjourned.]

(33)

A P P E N D I X

34

35

36

37

38

39

40

41

42

43

44

45

46

47

48

49

50

51

52

53

54

55

56

57

58

59

60

61

62

63

64

65

66

Æ