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This November, voters across the state have the opportunity to show their support for child care and working families in Texas.
In Tarrant County, local leaders have long recognized high-quality and accessible child care as essential for a thriving community. In recent years, our community has joined together to invest an historic nearly $60 million in combined resources to support child care initiatives.
However, families continue to struggle to find affordable care while child care programs are also struggling to keep their doors open without raising costs to families. As community and business leaders who care deeply about Tarrant County and our residents, we know that more needs to be done.
Among Tarrant County’s 97 zip codes, 49 (more than half) qualify as subsidized child care deserts, meaning the demand for child care among low-income families is at least three times greater than the supply of child care programs accepting government child care subsidies. Without collective action, this situation will certainly worsen over time as child care funding continues to decline.
More than $4 billion of federal COVID-19 relief funds recently expired on Sept. 30, cutting off the largest investment in child care to date and jeopardizing child care availability across the state. While some providers will manage to stay afloat, others will be forced to lay off educators, reduce enrollment capacity, or even close their doors entirely. We must do all we can to help prevent this from happening. Families and businesses in our community will suffer without child care providers who offer safe, high-quality care so that young children can learn and their parents can return to work or school.
In Fort Worth, Arlington, and Tarrant County, we are committed to creating a thriving community, driven by a world-class economy. And, we know firsthand that supporting working families and empowering small businesses by relieving them of certain economic burdens are two essential parts of the equation. This past legislative session, the legislature took initial steps at supporting child care with a proposed constitutional amendment: Proposition 2 (Prop 2).
Prop 2 is a landmark opportunity to ensure that child care providers, who are often small business owners, are included in Gov. Abbot’s $18 billion tax cut package. The amendment would allow municipalities (counties or cities) the ability to offer 50% to 100% property tax exemptions to licensed, quality-rated child care centers whose enrollment includes at least 20% of children participating in the Texas Workforce Commission’s subsidy program for low-income families.
If passed by voters and adopted locally, this would impact nearly 145 child care providers with the potential to serve approximately 13,300 children in Tarrant County. (This number is based on roughly 80% of the combined licensed capacity of all eligible programs; the typical threshold of enrollment for programs.) This number would likely grow as more providers become eligible. Ultimately, this relief could enable programs to reduce costs for families, support wages for child care educators, and invest in quality improvements for their programs. Most importantly, Proposition 2 could improve the availability of child care in our community, increasing families’ access to the affordable options they desperately need.
In anticipation of voter approval for Prop 2, we hope to work alongside our local elected officials to find a way to enact this much needed and hard-earned tax-relief for our child care providers. We know that this small act gives providers a better chance at keeping their doors open, without having to pass the financial burden onto our parents.
As business leaders, we recognize that this isn’t just impacting child care programs and families. The current lack of access to quality care also has a drastic impact on our local economy. Texas businesses lose roughly $11.4 billion annually because of insufficient child care. This comes in the form of lost tax revenue and costs associated with staff turnover, primarily women exiting the workforce, and low worker productivity. In Tarrant County, we pride ourselves on being one of the best places to both raise a family and operate a business. However, if we want to continue to attract and retain a talented workforce in our community, we must address these child care challenges.
As a community, we must come together to recognize the vital importance of a more supportive environment for child care programs, working families and their employers, and ultimately our greatest assets: young children. Together, we can answer this call.
Michelle Green-Ford is president and CEO of the Metropolitan Fort Worth Black Chamber of Commerce; Michael Jacobson is president and CEO of the Greater Arlington Chamber of Commerce; Anette Landeros is president and CEO of the Fort Worth Hispanic Chamber of Commerce; Steve Montgomery is the president and CEO of the Fort Worth Chamber of Commerce; and Alfreda Norman is the co-chair of the Tarrant County Blue Ribbon Action Committee on Child Care.
Constitutional Joint Elections
Vote at any precinct in Tarrant County.
Early voting: Oct. 23-27 — 8 a.m. to 5 p.m.; Oct. 28 — 7 a.m. to 7 p.m.; Oct. 29 — 10 a.m. to 4 p.m.; Oct. 30-Nov. 3 — 7 a.m. to 7 p.m.
Election Day: Nov. 7 — 7 a.m. to 7 p.m.