BlogUpdates on the Under 3 DC Budget Asks

Updates on Under 3 DC Budget Asks

FY 23 Mayor’s Proposed Budget/FY 22 Supplemental Budget

By Jarred Bowman, Tazra Mitchell and Nisa Hussain

 

Summary

The proposed budget meets each of our asks related to the child care subsidy program and the Early Educator Compensation Fund. It does not, however, include any additional investments in HealthySteps, Healthy Futures, or the Home Visiting programs. According to the Mayor’s Budget Office, there were no cuts to any of our family health programs including Help Me Grow, the Lactation Certification Preparatory Program or Early Head Start Home Visiting. The FY22 supplemental budget does not include any budgetary changes to the programs in the Birth-to-Three law.

Child Care

• Early educator compensation

• • • What we asked for: Preserve $72,889,000 in the Pay Equity Fund
    • How much is in the Mayor’s budget:  $72,889,000
    • Is our ask fully funded? YES
    • The CFO made an error in the budget books allocating $18M of this amount to the child care subsidy program. This will be fixed in the FY23 budget errata letter.

• Child care subsidy budget

• • • What we asked for: Preserve $139.5M
    • How much is in the Mayor’s budget: $139.5M
    • Is our ask fully funded? YES

• Sports Wagering for the Early Childhood Development Fund

  • What we asked for: Protect the $12.8 million dedicated to child care from the Sports Wagering Lottery Amendment Act of 2018 to ensure it goes to the child care sector beginning in FY 2024.
  • How much is in the Mayor’s budget: Keeps nearly $2.9M in dedicated funding for the Early Childhood Development Fund beginning in FY24, with funding sources coming from sports wagering and the lottery. This is $10 million lower than the funding in the current financial plan for FY24, with most of the cut coming from the lottery portion. It is unclear if the reduced funding is due to a revised forecast or from moving the funds elsewhere; it appears to be the former but we’re still confirming.  With that said, funding slightly increases each year as sports wagering revenues are expected to increase. 
  • Is our ask fully funded? UNCLEAR

• Federal Funds

• • Invests ARPA dollars in the FY23 budget as planned in last year’s FY22 budget to support pandemic recovery, including Access-2-Quality Grants, Back-2-Work Childcare grants, high-dosage tutoring, college scholarships for early educators. 

Outstanding questions:

• The budget books don’t note the $10M investments in FY22 and FY23 to fund the Cost of Care. It is unclear if this is a cut or somewhere else in the budget.
• It is unclear if the Mayor raided the lottery fund for child care, or if the $11M decrease is due to downward trending revenue projections

Family Health Support Programs

*We’ve heard from the budget director that there were no cuts to these programs, and will continue following up with Council and agency level partners to confirm.

• HealthySteps*

• • • What we asked for: 300K
    • How much is in the Mayor’s budget: There were no cuts or new investments in the Mayor’s budget.
    • Is our ask fully funded? NO

• Healthy Futures*

• • • What we asked for: $700K
    • How much is in the Mayor’s budget: There were no cuts or new investments in the Mayor’s budget.
    • Is our ask fully funded? NO
    • Of note, the Healthy Futures program mentioned in the Mayor’s FY23 budget refers to DBH’s clinical ECMH pilot program created last budget season using federal ARPA dollars. This program’s federal funding has been restored in the Mayor’s proposed FY23 budget.

• Lactation Certification Preparatory Program*

• • • What we asked for: Maintain level funding
    • How much is in the Mayor’s budget: There were no cuts or new investments in the Mayor’s budget.
    • Is our ask fully funded? YES

• Help Me Grow*

• • What we asked for: Maintain level funding
  • How much is in the Mayor’s budget: There were no cuts or new investments in the Mayor’s budget.
  • Is our ask fully funded? YES

• Home Visiting

• • • CFSA

      • What we asked for: $70,500 increase 
      • How much is in the Mayor’s budget: $310K
      • Is our ask fully funded? NO
      • The CFSA Home Visiting programs have had their one-time $ replaced in the Mayor’s proposed budget. The programs include Mary’s Center’s Father-Child Attachment Program and the Community Family Life Services program. We are waiting on confirmation that the $310,000 is recurring.

• • DC Health

    • What we asked for: $369,150 increase
    • How much is in the Mayor’s budget: There were no new investments in the Mayor’s budget.
    • Is our ask fully funded? NO
    • We are awaiting confirmation on the details for the $711,000 home visiting funding from DC Health. While this amount ($711K) does not reflect our FY23 ask, it does represent the level funding amount allocated in previous years.