We need your help to ensure low-income families can send their children to high-quality child care programs. Click "start writing" to sign and send letters to your Senators in 30 seconds.

All letters need to be in by Wednesday (8/12) at 8pm PST.

AB123, a California childcare bill which would alleviate some of the administrative and financial burdens of providing child care services, will enable child care for more families. It's being heard by the Senate Appropriations Committee on Thursday, August 13th, 2020.

The bill has two main issues, which the authors, Senators, and legislators need to know about:

1. Parents should be able to choose where they send their children- not be forced to go to the only available child care program. We ask that both Local Education Agencies ("LEAs") and community-based providers are included in the bill.

Community-based organizations, the non-profit and for-profit private childcares serving low-income families with subsidized care, are the programs who have supported children with consistent care and early education throughout this crisis. They are the providers who serve 80% of low-income children in California.

The bill needs to explicitly include both Local Education Agencies ("LEAs") and community-based organizations. Doing so will enable community-based providers  to use their existing high-quality teachers, infrastructure, and resources to serve children, while enabling larger, public school programs to also take on more children. Parents will then a choice of where to send their children - ideally the highest-quality, nearest program. If community-based organizations are not included, this will result in the permanent closing of high-quality programs, further exacerbating child care availability, equity, and quality issues.

2. The bill is not equitable for low-income and other families with need. We ask that the self-certification of income be removed from the bill, giving subsidized childcare to families with the greatest need.

The bill enables families receiving CalFresh or Medi-Cal to get care, which is fantastic. However, it also allows families to self-certify their income- meaning there's no one verifying they actually need subsidized care. Further, the bill removes the penalty of perjury for these families lying about their income.

History has shown that self-certification of income promotes fraud, and takes away spots from low-income families, and gives them to wealthy families. While we encourage a reduction in administrative burdens, we ask that a better solution be implemented- one that can efficiently check actual income, instead of removing a solution that is in place for good reason.