Newsroom

July 22, 2024

Dear Chairman Burgess and Ranking Member McGovern:

On behalf of the Under 3 DC Coalition, we write to urge you to reject Congresswoman Nancy Mace’s proposed amendment (Amendment #95) to H.R. 8773, the Financial Services and General Government Appropriations Act, that would prohibit the District of Columbia from expending funds to enforce local early childhood education (ECE) regulations regarding workforce qualifications, which are necessary to promote the healthy development of young children.

Representative Mace’s proposed amendment jeopardizes the District’s progress in reducing the child care crisis, dismisses the importance of high quality early childhood education, and disregards the thousands of parents across the District who demand quality child care. 

In developing standards for early childhood educators, the District relied on a large body of early childhood development research indicating that highly-qualified workers with specialized training are vital to the social, emotional and cognitive well-being of children.¹ High-quality early education increases a child’s readiness for kindergarten, promotes K-12 and post-secondary academic achievement, and improves social and economic outcomes throughout their life. This is particularly true for children who face challenges (premature birth, unstable living situation, disability, etc.) and require teachers with the knowledge, training, and experience to support their individual learning needs.

In addition to increasing standards, the District has a number of programs supporting educators to obtain required credentials, including expansion of free or low-cost access to early education degrees and credentialing, peer-networks across ECE facilities to provide professional development training, and ensuring workers are fairly compensated for their expertise. Far from stifling the industry, the District saw a 7% increase in its early childhood workforce in 2023 due to the latter intervention alone.²  

Notably, the District accomplished this without passing costs onto parents. In addition to a growing workforce to increase the supply of child care, the District has developed a robust set of policies to ensure child care remains affordable for parents, including a recent expansion to the child care subsidy program for families at or below 300% of the federal poverty level and a refundable tax credit for childcare expenses.³,⁴

The Under 3 DC Coalition - made up of early childhood education providers, educators, parents, economists, policy experts, grassroots community organizers, and community stakeholders across all eight wards of the District of Columbia - implores you to reject Amendment #95 to the FY25 Financial Services and General Government Appropriations Act. The District must be free to serve its residents by advancing best-practice ECE policy that helps early educators advance professionally, earn family-sustaining middle-class wages commensurate with their credentials, and provide the highest possible quality of care and education to infants and toddlers districtwide.

Thank you for your service to our nation and for respecting the District’s innovations and investments in early childhood education.

Sincerely, 

The Executive Committee of the Under 3 DC Coalition
Jacob Feinspan, Jews United for Justice
Kimberly Perry, DC Action
LaDon Love, SPACEs in Action
Sarah Barclay Hoffman, Children’s National Hospital
Sia Barbara Kamara, DC Early Learning Collaborative
Tazra Mitchell, DC Fiscal Policy Institute

1. Manning M, Garvis S, Fleming C, Wong T. W. G., “The relationship between teacher qualification and the quality of the early childhood care and learning environment,” Campbell Systematic Reviews 2017:1; Center on the Developing Child, “The Science of Early Childhood Development (InBrief),” 2007.
2.  Schochet, Owen, “Updated Findings Show Washington, DC’s Early Childhood Educator Pay Equity Fund Continues to Support DC’s Child Care and Early Education Workforce,” Mathematica, May 8, 2024. 
3. Gunderson, Anne, “Expanding Child Care Subsidies Would Boost the District’s Economy,” DC Fiscal Policy Institute, July 17, 2024
4. DC Office of Tax and Revenue, “Keep Child Care Affordable Tax Credit Frequently Asked Questions (FAQs),” Accessed July 2024. 

Contact: Tawana Jacobs | tjacobs@dckids.org | 301-325-8687

Mat Hanson | mhanson@dckids.org | 202-725-4769

Gutting subsidies for families and betraying the promise of equal pay for educators will hurt DC's businesses, families, young children and their teachers.

April 3, 2024—Today, District of Columbia Mayor Muriel Bowser released her proposed 2025 fiscal year budget that decimates the child care sector with massive, multi-year cuts to subsidies for families, and permanently eliminates the Early Childhood Educator Pay Equity Fund and HealthCare4ChildCare. 

Bowser’s budget proposal hurts working families and our local economy. At a time when high-quality child care in the District remains unaffordable and hard to find, as detailed in a Bainum Foundation study  released in February, these cuts will force child development facilities to increase costs for working families.  Another new study showed that lack of affordable care negatively impacts parents' ability to keep gainful employment and businesses' ability to operate.  These effects lead to lower incomes for families, worse productivity for businesses, and decreased tax revenue for the District. Under the current budget, child care challenges for parents of infants and toddlers lead to negative employment impacts that cost DC $8,100 per parent annually, or $252 million aggregated across all similar DC parents. The annual cost to businesses for each parent is $2,540, or $79 million aggregated across DC parents.  

The study also found that more than half of the parents surveyed said the high cost of care would make it harder for them to stay in the District - moving us farther away from the goal of a vibrant DC filled with working families. Early childhood education is an essential part of our economic infrastructure, as important as parks, office space, or retail shops. 

Bowser’s budget proposal hurts early educators, most of whom are Black and brown women. By permanently cutting pay and health benefits for more than 4,000 educators, Bowser will single-handedly be responsible for educators fleeing child care for higher paying jobs. Early educators could see their pay reduced by tens of thousands of dollars, returning many of their incomes to just a few dollars above the minimum wage.  

This is doubly betraying promises that the Mayor and DC Council made to early educators.  It reneges on the commitment in the Birth-to-Three For All DC Act to raise early educator salaries.  And the District required educators to meet new higher credential and degree requirements at the end of last year, which many have worked hard to do - now the Mayor proposes to break the promise of fair pay as compensation.

Quotes from Under 3 DC’s leadership

Tazra Mitchell, DC Fiscal Policy Institute: “The mayor’s budget takes an axe to the transformative investments—like the Pay Equity Fund—that DC has invested in recent years, prioritizing the wealthy business sector and police force over investments in DC residents struggling to get by. Eliminating the Pay Equity Fund and gutting the child care subsidy program will decimate the early education sector. Not only does the Mayor’s approach undermine her purported “economic comeback” vision, it backtracks on DC’s commitment to Black and brown educators fueling a sector that all other business sectors rely on. Her approach will set back the progress that DC has made on poverty reduction, greater economic inclusion, and closing racial and gender disparities that harm us all.”

Jacob Feinspan, Jews United for Justice: “The Thalmud teaches that children breathe life into the universe. To rob children of care – to rob educators of the resources they need to provide that care – would be shameful. The Council must not let the Mayor harm the thousands of working families who rely on these funds.”

Barbara Kamara, DC Early Learning Collaborative: “This budget undermines the increases proposed for downtown, sports team retention, the support for Metro and the economic vitality of DC.  Without the early childhood sector, the government and all businesses are all negatively impacted.”

Kimberly Perry, DC Action: “What Mayor Bowser proposed today is devastating to the District’s families with young children. Our local child care sector and its early educator workforce, comprised of mostly Black and brown women, deserve better. How can she prioritize business and economic growth while simultaneously cutting a critical lifeline for working parents– child care.  Current child care challenges cost District businesses nearly $80 million and families $252 million each year. If Bowser truly cares about supporting business and economic growth, this move is misguided and it is imperative that the DC Council reverse this terrible proposal. 

LaDon Love, SPACEs in Action: “The Mayor’s budget is a betrayal of the educators that working families depend on and threatens to wipe out the District’s child care sector. Showering money on billionaires and corporations while increasing costs for working people is both unjust and terrible economic policy.”

The DC Council will hear from the early learning community, business leaders, and DC residents tomorrow, Thursday, April 4, during what is expected to be a marathon education hearing that is scheduled to begin at 9:00 am.  And, an Early Educator Rally will take place on Friday, April 5th at 8:00 AM to call on the DC Council to act immediately to reverse these proposed cuts. 

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Under 3 DC harnesses the voices and power of the District’s parents with young children, early educators, and community-based organizations to shine a spotlight on the need for more public investments in early education and health programs for infants and toddlers. Together, we can set the District of Columbia on a path to creating and sustaining a high-quality, equitable early childhood system.

WJLA (ABC), March 13

Fox5DC, March 13