II 

112TH CONGRESS 

2D SESSION S. 2135 

To amend the Child Care and Development Block Grant Act of 1990 to 

authorize a national toll-free hotline and website, to develop and disseminate child care consumer education information for parents and to help 

parents access child care in their community, and for other purposes. 

IN THE SENATE OF THE UNITED STATES 

FEBRUARY 28, 2012 

Mrs. MURRAY (for herself and Ms. MIKULSKI) introduced the following bill; 

which was read twice and referred to the Committee on Health, Education, Labor, and Pensions 

A BILL 

To amend the Child Care and Development Block Grant 

Act of 1990 to authorize a national toll-free hotline and 

website, to develop and disseminate child care consumer 

education information for parents and to help parents 

access child care in their community, and for other purposes. 

1 Be it enacted by the Senate and House of Representa2 tives of the United States of America in Congress assembled, 

3 SECTION 1. SHORT TITLE. 

4 This Act may be cited as the ‘‘Child Care and Re5 sources Education Act of 2012’’. 

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•S 2135 IS

1 SEC. 2. PURPOSE. 

2 The purposes of this Act are— 

3 (1) to develop and disseminate child care con4 sumer education information for parents; and 

5 (2) to assist parents in finding safe, affordable, 

6 and quality child care in their community. 

7 SEC. 3. FINDINGS. 

8 Congress makes the following findings: 

9 (1) Nearly 11,000,000 children under age 5 are 

10 in some type of child care setting every week. 

11 (2) Numerous reports have found that child 

12 care is hard to find in many communities through13 out the United States. 

14 (3) A 2010 study by the National Institute of 

15 Child Health and Human Development found chil16 dren who received high-quality care in the first few 

17 years of life scored higher on measures of academic 

18 and cognitive achievement when the children were 15 

19 years old, and were less likely to misbehave, than 

20 children enrolled in low-quality care in those years. 

21 (4) More than 1,000,000 families a year receive 

22 assistance in finding child care through a national 

23 child care hotline and website, with nearly half the 

24 calls to the hotline coming from military families 

25 who are faced with deployment and need to find 

26 child care in their new community. 

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1 (5) The national child care hotline had 

2 57,000,000 page views by parents looking for child 

3 care in their community as well as parents looking 

4 for information about selecting a child care provider. 

5 (6) Over 200,000 publications were mailed to 

6 parents last year, in both English and Spanish, by 

7 the operator of the national hotline and website, to 

8 provide consumer education to parents looking for 

9 child care. 

10 SEC. 4. AMENDMENT. 

11 Section 658O(a) of the Child Care and Development 

12 Block Grant Act of 1990 (42 U.S.C. 9858m) is amended 

13 by adding at the end the following: 

14 ‘‘(3) NATIONAL TOLL-FREE HOTLINE AND

15 WEBSITE.—The Secretary shall reserve not less than 

16 $1,000,000 of the amount appropriated under this 

17 subchapter for each fiscal year for the operation of 

18 a national toll-free hotline and website, to develop 

19 and disseminate child care consumer education in20 formation for parents and to help parents access 

21 safe, affordable, and quality child care in their com22 munity.’’. 

Æ 

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