Assembly Budget Subcommittee No. 2 on Human Services

Good morning. Good morning. Today is our annual statewide review of ECE system funding. Now, in the context of historic recent investments in universal preschool and childcare expansions, but also in the context of continuing needs for more high quality childcare for California's families, I am pleased to have the first half of the agenda as an informational hearing to include our Legislative Women's Caucus leadership. It is so important to recognize how essential our ECE system is, how essential childcare is to the very functioning of our society.

Simply put, without a robust childcare system, California cannot operate. We must unleash the full talent of our working parents and guardians while ensuring the safety and the development of our young people. We've got to get this right. We learned it the hard way during the pandemic, and the worst thing we can do is now that the pandemic is over, pretend like the issue doesn't still exist.

It still exists, and we must fix it, because there's no doubt that one day we might have to shut down again. And it's more likely than not that it will happen at some point. And shame on us if it happens on our watch and we're not ready. In each of these panels, I ask our presenters to keep a core value in mind. How can the state continue to be better at stabilizing the lives of families and children through our childcare safety net?

How can we get smarter about breaking system barriers down so that our historic investments can succeed? As you all know, this is a joint budget informational hearing with sub one, I mean sub two and sub three. It is my honor to be able to serve side by side for my dear colleagues, Assemblymember Alvarez, for his open remarks.

Thank you, Assemblymember Doctor Jackson, Chair of our Sub Number 2. And thank you all for being here this morning. Even though the issues of early childhood education have now, as those of you who followed it very closely over the years, been split into subs.

We thought it was important for this conversation to occur among the two committees because really, our goals of promoting child development and supporting working families when it comes to childcare and development of our children needs to be working together through our childcare system, our early childcare system, preschool, obviously, and then as we'll discuss a little bit later, universal transitional kindergarten. So the implementation of universal transitional kindergarten is really critical. We are getting close to essentially what we had set as the deadline to implement this.

And as we will discuss a little bit later, we want to make sure that early childhood education fits in with that vision, that long term vision, and how it fits as the first grade in our school systems in California, in every one of our campuses. I'm certainly curious on how we can integrate our school based early childhood education systems into the larger childcare ecosystem that Doctor Jackson's Committee has been discussing. And we'll get into the details this morning in the first set of panels.

So with that, I just want to remind folks, we will take comment on the informational hearing issues of these next couple of panels at the end of the portion of this hearing, and then on the other issues at the end of that portion of the hearing that you have on your agenda. Thank you, Doctor Jackson.

Thank you very much, Assembly Member. Any other Assembly Members would like to make any comments? Yes, sir.

Thank you for convening this hearing. As chair of the education Committee, I'm a big believer in early education, as, you know, the best strategy to, to promote equity and close the achievement gap. However, I fully recognize that the impacts of universal transitional kindergarten is having a, causing a tremendous upheaval with the child care industry.

And so I think it's very appropriate that two committees are coming together today to address these two critical issues of how do we promote, continue to prioritize early education, while at the same time supporting and promoting access for quality childcare. Thank you.

Thank you very much, Assemblymember. And just note that Members of the Legislative Women's Caucus will be coming in and out throughout this portion. Of course, there's no doubt that there's been no greater champions on early childhood education than the Women's Caucus. And you better believe they hold us men accountable to making sure we implement their orders. Okay, so we look forward to the caucus Members joining us throughout this time.

We are going to bring up our first panel on issue number one, which is an opportunity to start a new tradition here, which is an annual priority setting discussion about the governor's master plan for early learning and care and priorities for the Newsom Administration. No one is interested in having another document, just to have another document and collect dust. We must operationalize this master plan, and we must make sure that we continue to find a way to have benchmarks on progress.

How do we know we're being successful? What are the next things? Are we gonna be tackling? And we're so happy to have the Administration here to talk about the master plan. And you may begin when you're ready.

Thank you so much. Good morning, chairs and Committee Members, Kim Johnson, California Department of Social Services, and appreciate the opening remarks related to the dual goals that we are trying to support for children and families across California, and also just want to point out the appreciation that we had this master plan prior to COVID allowing us as those new billions of federal dollars came into California, allowing us to be at a different readiness level in terms of implementation and operationalizing this plan. In 2019.

Actually, California launched the master plan for early learning and care to provide a roadmap to give all children, regardless of background, race, zip code, immigration status or income level, a great start in life.

By making comprehensive improvement to the state's early learning and care system, the master plan provides direction for building a better system over time, one that partners with families, takes a whole child approach to ensure the best child outcomes, and supports the advancement of early learning and care professionals to ensure every family has access to quality care and early learning supports.

The master plan was published in December of 2020, providing a 10 year roadmap and four overarching goals based on recommendations made by the Assembly's Blue Ribbon Commission on Early Childhood Education, the lifting children out of poverty task force, children's transforming the workforce rate reform, work groups, and many other voices in research.

The goals are listed on pages 2 and 3 of your agenda and include improving access to services, enhancing workforce development and creating equitable career pathways for educators and providers unifying funding, including the adoption of a new reimbursement rate structure, which we're glad to talk more about this morning, streamlining governance and Administration, including strengthening data systems.

The estimates for implementing this 10 year roadmap ranged from 2 billion to $12 billion, and due to historic again and unprecedented investments in early care and education at the state and federal levels, and updated policy improvements over the last few years. With a phenomenal commitment from the Governor and Legislature, California has already made great progress in implementing the master plan. The Governor's Budget includes $6.7 billion in total funding for child care and development programs in budget year.

This is enormous growth from the $1.7 billion approximately 10 years ago. The Committee asked about priorities and what is next, so I will address both as I go through the goal areas. In goal area one access the enrollment in the Alternative Payment Programs, which provides child care subsidies to low income families, has more than doubled, from 56,300 children in 2021 to 130,500 children in October of 2023.

Between fiscal years 21-22 and 22-23 there have been over 200 awards granted for General child care and development contractors supporting over 21,000 new subsidies in that space. We also have, of course, expanded universal preschool and transitional kindergarten programs that I know that my colleague at the Department of Education will speak more about in short, low income families in California that are eligible for child care subsidies have greater access to services than they ever have before.

In the second goal area related to the workforce, we know the importance of investing in the workforce to support children's learning and development or enhancing early educators competencies, incentivizing and funding career pathways, and implementing supportive program standards. The landscape has also changed significantly over the last few years with the establishment of child care providers united, or CCPU, representing in home family childcare providers and family friends and neighbors who support and provide subsidies to Low income families.

Two historic agreements between the State of California and CCPU have been reached, which also include things like newly established joint training partnership funds, again having that opportunity and access investments in healthcare and retirement benefits for the workforce supports for new training opportunities to again strengthen and improve the quality of care delivered.

We've also made focused investments in inclusive early education, supporting children with disabilities, supporting and strengthening multilingual learning, having limited the ability to suspend and expel youth from early learning programs, mental health consultation, and providing training, grants and incentives. In short, the workforce has greater access to education, training, and support than they ever have before. In goal area three related to funding, I also in terms of that affordability and key access to subsidy, we have also reformed the family fee schedule across California.

Beginning last year, family fees cannot exceed 1% of a family's monthly income, again ensuring that low income families have the economic supports that they need. And of course, we are in the process of completely reforming the rate structure for subsidies again, which we'll talk about later on this morning. But really moving from a two rate structure to a single reimbursement rate structure in alternative methodology that looks at the costs of providing services.

And finally, under goal area four streamlining, we've begun work on the early childhood integrated data systems, providing a framework to coordinate siloed data systems, facilitate data sharing across programs, and answer key policy questions about children's development, the supply of care, and workforce needs. We've also streamlined eligibility for families in a number of programs, reducing churn off of the programs at both the Department of Education and Social Services.

We've also done administrative efficiencies like offering contractors the opportunity for direct deposit and payment and really accelerating the dollars getting to those contractors. And of course, we've transitioned the programs across. We certainly have more to do, but I will again just underscore the master plan and its ability to help us implement over the last few years, creating that unprecedented success that we have. Some of the things that I just referenced, we are still in the process of implementing like rate reform that we'll talk about more.

But again, overarchingly, the success that we've had over the last few years has been like any other in prior history, and I'm happy to answer questions. Thank you.

Good morning, Mister Chair and Members of the Committee, Sarah Neville Morgan from the California Department of Education here on behalf of State Superintendent of Public Instruction Tony Thurmond and I would like to dedicate today's testimony from CDE to Delaine Easton, our first and only to date state Superintendent, who was a woman and who passed away this morning. So Delaine, a champion of education, of children and of universal Pre K, this is for you.

I'll start by giving a brief update based on what Director Johnson was able to do to add on some specifics around where CDE has implemented recommendations from the master plan, and then briefly touch on some recommendations from a recent workgroup that we've held on universal pre K mixed delivery, quality and access that further advances the master plan recommendations first, California launched Universal Pre K in 2022 to 23, implementing a key recommendation in the master plan to expand access to one year of free, universally available and inclusive pre K for all four year olds and expanding targeted access to an additional year of publicly funded pre k for all three year olds from Low income families as well as children with disabilities.

TK is in the second year or transitional kindergarten in the second year of expansion and will be universally available to all four-year-olds alongside an array of other preschool options, some of which are eligibility-dependent by 2025-26. Additionally, our California State preschool programs have begun to serve more three-year-olds and children with disabilities. Thanks to key legislative changes, our programs are now reaching 11.5%. I know it's still low. Of the eligible three-year-old population.

This is up from the previous year where it was only 8.5% of eligible three year olds. So still much room for growth in California in serving eligible three year olds with two years of high quality public pre k. To address the master plan recommendations to update our state early learning guidelines and integrate supports for multilingual learners and children with disabilities, CDE has revised the state's preschool early learning standards.

The Preschool Learning Foundations recently renamed the Preschool Transitional Kindergarten Learning Foundations to be more inclusive of TK, address racial bias, be more inclusive of multilingual learners and children with disabilities, and incorporate the latest science of learning and development.

Third, to address the recommendation to ensure equitable treatment of children and eliminate bias through practices and training interstate preschool program, California passed legislation that has created a process for identifying dual language learners and teacher parent conversations about language development, enabling our state preschool programs to better support those learners home language development as well as increase their access to English. We introduced categorical eligibility for children with disabilities as well as a requirement for state preschool to set aside 10% of their spaces for children with disabilities.

Similar to Head Start, ensuring greater inclusion for our children. We also limited suspensions and expulsions except in extreme circumstances to reduce the exclusionary discipline practices, which research shows disproportionately targets children of color, particularly black boys and American Indian boys, and our children with disabilities to support our state preschool program. In meeting these, the CDE has issued guidance, provided technical assistance, created a dual language learner webinar series and a resource page, and we have implemented recently the classic tool to support responsive interactions.

As a quick note on that, in some conversations with Dallas Independent School District who has been implementing class for the past several years, they recently were able to eliminate all of their out of school suspensions and expulsions in grades k three and had kids on grade level for third grade reading and are really attributing that to their coaching around the class.

Implementation to address the master plan recommendations to enhance educator competencies, incentivizing and funding career pathways, and implementing supportive program standards, California has made some significant, mainly one time investments in professional development for existing teachers for teacher prep programs, financial aid, and other supports to support aspiring teachers both into the preschool state preschool area as well as into TK and beyond.

And the Commission on Teacher Credentialing recently established a new pk to third grade ECE specialist credential, allowing more people to move into those early grades with a stronger background in child development. Fifth, there have been changes addressing the master plan recommendations to streamline early education governance and eligibility. I'm just going to highlight again a few related to our California State preschool program.

We now have 24 month eligibility for state preschool, creating continuity of care and much needed stability for California's working families and also the categorical eligibility for children where one Member of a family receives benefits from means tested government programs such as Medi Cal and Head Start.

Last year's budget also streamlined prioritization around 3 and 4 year olds, enabling us to serve more of the three year olds in our state preschool program as TK continues to expand and more families might be choosing that as their preschool program. Finally, we're really excited to share that we just submitted to all of you.

I think last week the UPK mixed delivery quality and access workgroups report, which we convened in consultation with cdss with the State Board of Education and also partnered with the Commission on Teacher credentialing on this addressed ways to increase access to high quality UPK programs for 3 and 4 year olds and according to the statutory authority around it, did not include new costs. As you can imagine, there was a lot of dancing around when there are no new costs included.

So we do have a section that has other considerations as well. There were a total of over 100 recommendations. It is quite a dense report and also has numerous other resources that were included as we looked at it.

Some of the highlights to bring up are to look at our state preschool programs and move forward in adopting an evidence based curriculum that is aligned with the preschool, transitional kindergarten learning foundations and our desired results developmental profile and best supports children as they move through any coherent aligned p three approach and also some changes or recommendations around competencies and career pathways that would allow more programs to hold essential professional development days for their staff that are actually funded.

So making sure that professional development is available to our programs. As we look through the other considerations, a key one is how we support more pathways for more programs to come in and be part of UPK and ensure through that that they can meet the UPK program standards and are supported in that. I have with me some of my team, Stephen Profit are in Virginia Early if any questions come up that we need to dive into with them. Thank you.

Thank you very much. Can you let us know from each of your purviews what does the Administration try hope to to have achieved by the end of the Newsom Administration?

Thank you for the question chair. One of the pieces around improved and increased access to subsidies. I referenced some of the numbers to date, but we do have a promise of 200,000 new subsidies that we plan to achieve by 25-26. The implementation of the single rate structure that is informed by the cost of care, that is another specific milestone. And then also as it relates to training and the rate structure is an enhanced rate structure that looks at the competencies of the workforce as well. So those are a few specifics.

I can't speak for the Administration, but I can speak for the State Superintendent. And one of our key questions as we look at all of this is how do we know that children are better off? And so as we look at the investments, always asking ourselves what are the program goals?

I think that you just suggested and following some of the data to make sure that as children go through our educational system, they actually have more access to better opportunities and as they go into life, that they have more access to college, career and pathways that allow them the full spectrum of home ownership, of greater civic engagement.

And all the components we know are associated with high quality pre k. A high priority in that, that the state Superintendent always raises up is making sure that we have the compensation and the rates for our programs that can address them in meeting those standards.

Thank you. I'll ask one other question on how the engagement from the public as it relates to the master plan, given that we are in an implementation phase, how is that being tracked or monitored in a way that I'll say is understandable, like how far we've gone and how much we've got to go. One of the things we hear a lot with implementation of programs, especially anything that overlaps in any way with the pandemic years, is delays, and we hear that quite a bit.

So I'm just curious if there are any very specific delays that you think the master plan that we should be aware of. And then the other question is what I mentioned when I started my comments, which is how are we, how is the public able to track progress?

Thank you for the question, chair Alvarez. The early Childhood Policy Council actually has a statutory requirement related to providing specific recommendations directly to the Governor, Legislature and Superintendent on a number of aspects inclusive of the master plan. So that is the public forum. The council meets about four times per year, also has parent and Workforce Committee meetings in addition to those General meetings. Both Miss Neville-Morgan and I are both Members of that council. So it does have the cross departmental representation as well.

So that is the primary forum by which we're providing updates on, on the master plan and also getting input and advisement back from the council Members as well as the public into progress and direction going forward.

So these are publicly noticed meetings on the website people can attend?

Absolutely. And we've had, I would say, on average, more than 400 Members of the public attending. We're doing hybrid meetings and allowing for public to participate remotely. So. Yes.

And do minutes and comments from public get published?

Yes, they are available on the California Health and Human Services Agency website.

And then my second question, which was, are there any that we have identified now halfway through, essentially, that we anticipate, you know, of the specific strategies or goals that will, we know we're falling behind on now or anticipate we will.

Be, I would again say we've made significant progress. The master plan didn't necessarily give specific monthly year to the 10 year roadmap, but, you know, four years in, again, we are three and a half years in. We've made very, very significant progress. So in terms of priority setting and having that dialogue with the public around any of the additional goals that we have to achieve, again, we would do that through the council. So nothing to flag at this point in terms of areas from my perspective?

Well, I think that the chair, you know, stated that this is a hopefully part of a new tradition of annual review where we will also have a legislative opportunity to hear on progress. And I would anticipate on a going forward basis that you help us identify components that, perhaps especially as we get to really mid year next year or midterm of the 10 year next year, just so that we are all aware of what the expectations should be by 2030. Thank you both. Appreciate it.

We are moving on to issue number two, which is as part of the 2021-22 Budget Act, California launched, as we heard earlier, the universal preschool commitment, pre-kindergarten, and preschool options for all four-year-olds in the year before kindergarten. The commitment and its timeline of full implementation in 2526 that is next year. Everybody is ambitious and certainly historic. The panel now will discuss universal transition kindergarten implementation and how we are doing towards this goal.

And I certainly have a lot of questions that have arisen as a result of all of our budget discussions on TK and look forward to asking my questions. But first look forward to hearing from the LAO's office, Department of Education, Los Angeles Unified School District and Washington elementary school districts. Please proceed.

Good morning. Sara Cortez with the Legislative Analyst Office. I was asked to provide an overview of recent actions related to transitional kindergarten. Transitional kindergarten is the first year of a two year kindergarten program offered by public elementary schools. Prior to 22-23 students were eligible for TK if they had their fifth birthday between September 2 and December 2. As part of the 21-22 budget agreement, the state established a plan to gradually expand and TK to all four year olds from 22-23 through 25-26.

The expansion schedule is shown on page six of your agenda. TK students generate ADA based funding through the Local Control Funding Formula. In addition to expansion, the state also made programmatic changes. These are listed in detail in your agenda on page six and page seven, so I'll highlight just a few of the changes.

Such as TK classrooms must on average have one adult for every 12 students, and this is planned to move to one adult for every 10 students in 25-26 and the creation of add on funding. To cover these costs, the state provided funds to support expansion such as 590 million in facility support across 21-22 and 22-23 500 million in planning support across 21-22 and 22-23.

In addition to all of these TK changes, there were also changes intended to support the state preschool program. Taking into account the impact TK expansion would have on state preschool, the other states subsidized program. For example, in 22-23 the state increased the income eligibility threshold from 75% of state medium income to 100% of state median income, increasing the number of children that are eligible for the state preschool program.

And the state also increased the rate for three year olds in the state preschool program by 80% in 22-23. So I'll leave it there. That'll conclude my remarks, but I'm happy to take questions.

Thank you.

Good morning Mister chair and Members of the Committee, Stephen Propheter, Director of the Early Education Division, presenting today on behalf of the State Superintendent of Public Instruction, Tony Thurmond. We greatly appreciate the administration's continuing commitment to education overall and to universal pre-K in particular.

With nearly 900,003 and four year old children in the state, universal pre-K for all four year olds and an increasing number of three year olds will be and already is transformative for California's families and young children as UPK programs provide a strong and early start to education and support equitable opportunities for school readiness through high quality, joyful, developmentally informed, inclusive and rigorous pre K programs.

California's implementation of UPK includes transitional kindergarten, which is the only universal and free option, which in 2526 will be available to all four year old children alongside an array of other preschool programs, some of which are eligibility dependent. To bring some parents voices into the room on UPK, some parents have shared, and I quote, in this school she's learning two languages, Spanish and English. Her language skills are improving and her development is advancing. She is learning and advancing, which helps my family.

Her language development has grown significantly, which was not happening in our home. That was from a parent from Oakland Unified. Second quote, I'm glad my son got the opportunity to be introduced to school. With kids close in age and development, he is slowly but surely becoming more vocal and unafraid to speak up in class. I was a parent of a TK student in San Diego Unified.

This year, transitional kindergarten is available for all children born between or have their fifth birthday between September 2 and April 2. The average daily attendance for transitional kindergarten in fall 2023 was 124,909.

In the budget year, TK will increase to serve children whose birthdays are through June 2, providing access to another estimated 71,004 year old children and looking at some of the planning and implementation data which we collected through the up through the appropriation of the UPK planning and implementation funds, 81% of leas who offered TK reported that they offer TK at all of their elementary schools.

82% of leas who offered TK reported that they are offering full day TK programs either alone or alongside part day TK programs. As part of that appropriation, CDE is supporting their current workforce and developing and recruiting new educators through numerous different programs and grants, including the early education Teacher Development Grant, which has provided credit bearing coursework to 831 TK and CSPP, California State Preschool Program, teacher candidates, along with training to more than 5000 teachers and 1000 administrators.

As we look at the system, the investments the Legislature has made in the UPK planning and implementation and the UPK local mixed delivery planning grants have been helpful to support implementation at the school district and regional level. Many county offices of education have hired UPK coordinators who have been a critical resource for supporting UPK implementation and alignment across counties.

We regularly hear about how instrumental these coordinators are and have been, and how important it is for funding to continue after the current grant funds have run out. On our previous panel, Deputy Superintendent Neville-Morgan shared some of our work in the UPK mixed delivery, quality and access workgroup. The workgroup, which concluded recently, heard from more than 30 researchers, hundreds of parents, and preschool educators and administrators across the UPK system to inform the report.

Recommendations we are particularly proud of our focus on elevating family and practitioner voices. Throughout the process. We connected with families enrolled in family childcare homes, center based dual immersion programs, and tribal programs from various areas of the state and from backgrounds that have historically had limited access or been excluded to system level decision making processes and elevated their voices to understand their experiences in the preschool system and to uplift what they want most for their children.

Now that the workgroup work is complete, CDE will be updating regulations for state preschool to incorporate recommendations. We've already highlighted a few on the last panel. The workgroup report covered recommended changes to regulations as well as CDE administrative practices that CDE can implement without any cost or additional legislative action.

I'll just highlight a couple for example, changing regulations to require programs to implement all standards with a focus on increasing diversity, equity, and inclusion and belonging, including a specific attention to culturally, linguistically, and racially affirming practices and equitable child development and school readiness outcomes.

As our Deputy Superintendent mentioned, the workgroup also included other considerations for the Legislature to consider to the extent that funds become available, including reevaluating existing measurement systems and incentives to address equity and resource distribution and support continuous quality improvement for all prospective UPK programs, including job embedded coaching and quality improvement support for program administrators and educators and finally, expanding the state preschool quality rating and improvement system block grant to support all state preschool programs.

It currently doesn't reach all state preschools, reflecting both state preschool expansion since 2012 as well as annual cost of living adjustments. And I am joined by Sarah Neville, Morgan and Virginia Early to assist in answering any questions at the appropriate time.

Good Morning chair Alvarez, Chair Jackson and Members, my name is Doctor Dean Tagawa and I'm the Executive Director for the Early Childhood Education division within LA Unified School District. Los Angeles Unified has been a leader in expanding area access to transitional kindergarten. Not counting the enrollment dip we saw during COVID we've seen a steady increase in our TK numbers as the program has expanded since 2012. In 2019, we served approximately 12,000 children in TK and this year we have enrolled over 16,000 students.

Of those 16,000 kids, 5000 are paid with local district funds. LA Unified has always prioritized access in TK, making the program available to children ahead of the state mandate. Since 2019, LA Unified has dedicated an estimated 295 million in LCFF dollars to serving children who are not yet eligible for state funded TK. Our TK programs are modeled after our highly successful state preschool programs at our state funded early education centers and our state preschool programs on elementary campuses.

Just like our state preschool programs, you will see lots of activity areas for kids to play, learn and explore in. I often think if you could hear smiles, you should visit one of our centers. I was fortunate to be a principal when TK first began. Since its inception, we knew it had to be based on social emotional development or a language development with developmentally appropriate strategies that would strengthen foundations for later learning.

We worked hard to make sure that our parents were being given a developmentally appropriate progress report three times a year to ensure they understood how their child is getting ready to to be successful in Kinder. As the program expanded, we included inclusive classrooms for children with special needs where a General education teacher and early childhood credentialed special education teacher worked collaboratively all day to support both General Ed Students and those with exceptional needs.

If you were to visit one of those classrooms, you probably couldn't tell which child was General Ed and which one had special needs. In addition, these rooms have a full time transitional kindergarten instructional aid and a special education aid. We also have dual language classrooms in Spanish, Armenian, Chinese and Korean.

To honor their cultural and linguistic heritages, we have provided administrators, central office staff and teacher leaders with training on the alignment between the foundations, the preschool learning foundations, and the kindergarten Common Core state standards and how they were supported by our curriculum. And to support the new learning, we held training during summer institutes, Saturdays, weekdays at principal meetings, and in something we call bite sized professional developments.

These bite sized PD's are given on Tuesdays in 45 minutes blocks and focus on key strategies that can be used the very next day with teachers in their classrooms. We've been fortunate to have a deep pool of TK teachers and been very aggressive about recruiting at college campuses. Many of the teachers that teach TK were also teachers in our school readiness and language development program that was closed in 2015 and converted into full day TK programs.

These teachers were child development majors, had preschool experience, or were teaching in this program for many years, so they had the requisite professional experience to meet TK teacher qualifications. Before the 2015 school year, we brought together a group of these teachers and ask them to develop a Tk resource guide for anyone teaching in an expanded TK classroom. That guide, although revised, is still in use today.

We create an internal workgroup of over 600 teachers where trainings are posted, resource materials can be accessed, and teachers can support one another through discussion boards. We also speak with our principals at monthly meetings. This investment into communication and professional development has helped us develop an instructional system that ensures all folks are equally equipped and knowledgeable. This year alone, we have brought training to over 3000 participants, administrators, teachers, and aides.

The biggest challenge that LA Unified is facing regarding its UTK expansion is the onerous and rigid penalties that have been implemented by the Legislator for class sizes and ratios. I can't think of another area of education, including our state preschool programs, which also serve four year olds, where districts face multiple overlapping penalties for even very slight shortcomings in staff staffing, ratios and class size requirements.

When TK was first expanded, schools received funding to hire a paraprofessional in each class to create a class ratio of 12 to one and a maximum class size of 24. Even though TK expansion would not be fully completed until 2025, the penalties for violating these ratios were implemented in 2022. These penalties have continued even as the Legislature has repeatedly delayed funding in preschool, TK, and full day kindergarten facility block grants.

The penalties for class sizes and ratios are assessed as a condition of apportionment, meaning every one classroom that's out of compliance for part of the year can result in a substantial penalty. In 22-23 only three LAUSD schools out of over 100 that were audited did not meet that class size portion.

All of these schools had staffing and facilities for only a single class and did not want to deny enrollment to a family in their service area with whom they are developing a relationship that would last for many years. Despite 97% compliance out of a sample schools that were audited, the district will face an estimated penalty of $7 million for 22-23 for not meeting the average class size requirements, a penalty that is identical whether the district had all schools out of compliance or only a handful.

Making it worse, the Legislature amended statute last year to add TK penalties to the list of statutes that are not granted that cannot be granted a waiver. The budget agreement made last year in Senate Bill 114 exacerbated the penalty situation and SB 114. The Legislature allowed children born in July and August to attend TK for the first time. This expansion had been first proposed by the Governor in January, and Los Angeles unified began recruiting families immediately for the spring.

By July 10, 2023 when SB 114 was signed, La Unified had already enrolled over 1600 families with children born in the summertime known as early enrollment students. SB 114 introduced new requirements for early enrollment students, including a class size maximum of 20 and a 10-to-one ratio with penalties assessed if even one of these classrooms is out of compliance. LA Unified was forced to make a decision between disenrolling families with only a month's notice and risking substantial penalties.

We decided to choose to risk the penalties to do what is right for our students and our families. We urge this Legislature to take immediate action to waive all TK penalties until after implementation is completed in 25-26.

We also urge the Legislature to attend stat to amend statute to allow school districts to seek a waiver from the state board for the TK class size and ratio requirements that are beyond their control, or to amend average class size penalty to be prorated by the percentage of schools out of compliance rather than a flat penalty for even one school being over the limit.

Can I ask you to please wrap up your comments? So we ca go to the next speaker.

While we believe these penalties need to be reviewed, we are thankful for our state. All it has done to create transitional kindergarten so all children have an opportunity under the universal pre k umbrella to attend a year of preschool before kindergarten. Thank you.

Good morning Mister chair and Members of the Committee. My name is Rahele Atabaki. I'm the Director of early childhood education, expanded learning programs and new teacher injection at Washington Unified School District. Washington Unified is located in Yolo County, right across the bridge. We are a small district. We have six transitional kindergarten classes currently and we also have six preschool state preschool classrooms. These are spread across three to four of our seven schools.

We have AM/PM model, and we are operating with a 10 to one student-to-staff ratio right now, using our one-time monies to add extra support staff. We are using our paraeducators to support the classrooms. We also offer extended daycare through the ELA program, which is provided by our community-based providers for students who need it. The students that join the afterschool program have their own designated rooms. They are furnished and renovated specifically for TK and K students, supporting their growth and development.

Additionally, we have added professional development opportunities for TK staff in the past few years by bringing in experts in the early childhood education world. These trainers have offered guidance and research based strategies to empower educators and to help them meet the diverse needs of our TK students. We have also added full inclusion TK classrooms, which include our special Ed Students as well as our General Ed Students.

Together, we are using formative assessments such as observations, student work samples, and informal check ins to provide ongoing feedback to families and monitor student learning. We're moving towards using drdps for next year to assess students development across various domains. We are modeling our program also after our state preschool, which is very successful. Looking ahead. Our goal is to bring transitional kindergarten to all our schools with probably the next two to three years.

One of our plans is to bring dual immersion TK to one of our dual immersion schools. We have provided extensive training sessions to our staff as well as our after school staff to make sure that they can make age appropriate adjustments for our incoming students. All our TK principals have also attended early childhood education training this past year. We are redesigning our transitional kindergarten state preschool playgrounds this summer to make sure that they cater to the needs of our younger learners and have age appropriate equipment. I'm more than happy to address any questions you might have.

Thank you. Appreciate all the panelists. I think from my perspective and turn it over to our colleagues, the conversation about transitional kindergarten universal transitional kindergarten is really there's two components that are as important. One is access, but then the second is quality. And so my questions are based on those two components. Let me start with potentially the easier one, trying to get a grasp on the access and where we stand in terms of the enrollment trends.

Because all of you who do this 24/7 as educators always tend to do, you know that enrollment has been an issue and declining enrollment, and there's different trends where we see different things. So I'm curious, from the universal TK perspective, maybe from department's perspective, it sounds like in the two districts we have before us today, there's been an increase in demand and interest. But what are the trends statewide? What should we anticipate?

So, regarding the current uptake, we know that prior to transitional kindergarten expansion, the rate of enrollment was about 63% for transitional kindergarten for eligible children. I know at CDE we are currently working to finalize data for the the annual enrollment data for the last couple of years as far. And so some of that data has been somewhat delayed, but 63% is our pre expansion number.

What year are you referring to?

I'm sorry? 2021-22.

And that's the latest available data, correct. Lao, please.

So it's difficult to assess kind of a take up percentage, take up enrollment, because we have such delayed enrollment data. The best we can do at this point is look at our Ada data, which is a little bit different. It's not getting the number of kids enrolled, but it's getting the number of kids attended. So it's going to under, it's going to, it's going to underscore the number of children enrolled. But we do have ADA data for purposes of LCFF, and the main purpose is funding.

So I can share preliminary ADA data from 23-24. So that's ADA collected through December is about roughly 125,000 students. And so that doesn't give you like, that's not the number of enrolled students. It likely understates that, but this was an increase of about 31,000 ADA from 22-23. And I want to just highlight some of the flaws in looking at ADA numbers and looking at it compared to enrollment. But it mostly gives you a good sense that there is growth in the program.

A big flaw is I mentioned attendance. The second flaw is the early admittance. It's only capturing those students that generate Ada. So it's not capturing anybody with birthdays outside of the eligibility window until they start generating it. But because this is only preliminary data, that's not going to capture those early admittance kids.

Appreciate that. That sort of leads to the next question, which from a budget perspective is how do we plan for where we're going in terms of, in the number of students and what that cost would be as we transition to in 25-26 to the ratios that are required in full implementation. How are we then? I guess the question is, how are we projecting this in terms of what the LAO is analyzing?

And I know the Department is not here, finance is not here, but maybe CDE can help us.

Sure. Yes. So we're all looking at the same ADA information as it comes and incorporating those data into our models to project where we think the LCFF costs are going to come in. So we anticipate in May the Administration will provide the most recent estimates as they do. They provide the estimates in January, they'll provide some in May. This was typical practice, and we'll take those estimates and review them to see if we agree with those estimates.

So it sounds like everybody's using the same sets of data to make the determination, so there's not a lot of conflict and probably what the LAO estimates would be in terms of implementation.

There might be changes in kind of methodology and our approaches, but we are relying on this ADA data is the best thing that we have that will drive the LCFF cost.

Okay, sure.

Do you think it's fair to say that we can expect that that, or it's fair to assume that the percentage kind of the subscription rate will increase somewhat as we think about the families who are enrolling, who will be enrolling children, their children in TK in 25-26. This program expansion was kind of announced when they were having children. And we know many families actually plan around, you know, plan even births around TK eligibility dates.

So I think our internal analysis, we're looking at between 65 and 67% uptake in 25-26. But of course, we'll continue to monitor data and update those estimates.

The districts gave some testimonials on what they're doing with the, as it relates to the student teacher ratio and the paraprofessionals and those that are, in their case, who they're utilizing to ensure that the ratios are there. But we have received a lot of testimony otherwise that it's challenging for districts to implement those ratios and to find the qualified individuals that meet the requirements of full implementation.

Certainly, the districts can one of you if you would like to provide some comment about that. I'm also interested in hearing what the Department is hearing on that front and if the LAO wants to chime in, but I don't know if any of the districts have some thoughts on that.

So, again, we haven't had the same challenges as other districts, partly because of our size and partly because we've been in the early Ed space for a long time. But some of the things that we have done around recruiting has been important. I think things that the state has put in place to allow teachers to start teaching before finishing their credential. Having their bachelor's degree have been helpful, too, to make sure.

I think also CTC developing that p-three credential will give us some long term relief and really help the field overall.

So let me ask you, since you're large enough, it's an interesting point. Are you seeing teachers moving from upper grade? Is that how you're feeling those ratios, or who are becoming these new TK teachers in these new classrooms?

So I'm gonna say that the TK teachers who've been coming into those classrooms are the people who really want to work with the younger kids, which has been a very positive thing. And then I think the support that we're getting from, we started a position called the transitional kindergarten Instructional aid, which is a full time position.

So teachers in these grade levels know that they're gonna also have support which has made it, I'm going to say, a little bit more attractive for teachers who want to be with the younger kids. So.

Sorry, I get that. And I understand, what I was trying to understand is like, you've got to find new teacher. Where are you finding them? Are they the ones that are moving from within or are they new graduates? Who are these teachers? And is it because your enrollment trends are showing maybe in some of the higher still elementary grades, maybe lower, and you're able to capture some of those teachers in TK? Just how are you managing that?

So a lot of recruitment with colleges to get in younger teachers.

Do you have a different perspective?

I would add that in our district we have been lucky to recruit some of our preschool, state preschool teachers. I feel like they're the most expert in this area. So the district was able to support them in getting the, they're continuing their education and being able to get their credential.

So they're becoming the teachers?

Yes. So we currently have two that have moved from being state preschool teachers into TK.

And LA are you seeing some of that as well?

Yes, the same.

Okay. I want to ask about, again, continuing on the issue of quality, and I think Washington maybe mentioned this and I was trying to write down some notes, but the previous panel talked about the class assessment for preschool for pre k. What are we doing? And I heard about the age development appropriate, three periods, sort of progress reports. I don't know what they're called in TK, so I captured that. But are there other assessments or thinking about using that same assessment from preschool in TK? Can you tell me what you're doing? I heard you say something.

So the old assessment that we have was a very watered down kindergarten type assessment. So we've made the changes to start using the DRDP, which is what the state preschool uses. The TK teachers have been attending trainings this past year and they're full on ready for next year to start the DRDP.

Okay. And LA what are you.

So we developed a TK progress report which was based off of the preschool learning foundations, but it's embedded into the student information system so that TK teachers could access it.

Okay.

It's very similar to the DRDP as well.

Okay. And I know the panelists from CDE is not here, but I don't know if you can say anything about the, what was presented in terms of the assessment. I think it was, she mentioned the class assessment from preschool. And I'm just curious, is the Department providing districts with that as a option? First, how are we giving supports to districts on how to assess progress?

So we have. So currently the clinical class or the classroom assessment scoring system is a requirement for our California State preschool programs beginning next year. As part of implementation, CDE is rolling out supports for state preschool programs that are required to implement it. Currently, districts beyond the California State Preschool program are not required to, but we know that California has invested. I believe this will be touched on a quality and workforce panel invested in a quality support system throughout the state that TK can participate in.

TK isn't funded, at least through that statewide investment of 50 million for the state preschool quality rating and improvement system. But it is something that TK school districts could work with. Quality counts, consortia to participate in.

Okay, I'm going to turn it over to our colleagues, see if we have some questions. And then, unfortunately, I have to go present a Bill at another Committee, but I'll be back. I think the only remaining issue that was brought up by LA Unified that I want to acknowledge was race was on the ratios and the penalties, and certainly something that's been brought up to our attention.

But in, one of the great things about having staff with institutional knowledge, not just in this Committee, but in the topic, is to be able to learn off of our staff and confirm that the penalties on 12 to one have been there from the beginning, the 10 to one, I understand, on the requirements for the July and August births. And so we, I had a meeting yesterday with LA Unified to talk about this.

I think what I would, the only thing I'd say is it'd be interesting in here, and we heard a little bit from LA Unified yesterday on some unique circumstances on when this occurs and where perhaps districts may have, I'll just say a case, but otherwise, it was pretty clear what the intent was with trying to balance all the needs of early childcare education in establishing those penalties.

And so I just want to say, appreciate that there's been a commitment from places like La unified even prior to, to full adoption and moving the direction of universal TK, and acknowledge that work. But going forward, I think what would be helpful is identifying circumstances in which maybe the rule doesn't make sense for very specific reasons. And so, again, your district did present some, some ideas of that.

And that's what I think we'd be interested in hearing more from other districts, because I know other districts have an interest in on this topic as well. So appreciate that. And with that, I'll turn it over to Mister Muratsuchi.

Thank you very much. So, first of all, I want to join Miss Neville and pay my respects to Delaine Easton, our first woman state Superintendent, may she rest in peace. I think it's appropriate that we are focusing on early education, something that she championed. And so in that vein. I apologize.

I missed the LAO's presentation. But bottom line, what is your overall assessment in terms of what are our biggest challenges in achieving or working toward our universal TK by 25-26?

So my presentation was just an overview of recent actions. I actually didn't weigh in on some of the most pressing challenges. So appreciate the question, but some of the most pressing challenges we've been hearing about are some of the workforce challenges. So getting the workforce in place.

And we've had some discussion in terms of what districts are doing to address that workforce challenge. What about school facilities?

So we do have some data on the facility's challenges. So I guess stepping back to when TK expansion was first discussed, workforce and facilities were elevated as some of the major challenges that school districts would face. But the workforce seems to be the most pressing with, with the facilities issue. Based on reports submitted to the Department of Education by 829 school districts as part of the one time planning grant, about 75% of schools reported that they have adequate space to meet projected enrollment.

So in our view, that's not as pressing of an issue as the workforce issue that was raised when comparing the two. But that said, there are 25% of schools. The remaining of that, the flip side that reported that they don't have adequate space at the time of the survey.

Okay. The two districts that we have represented, what is your experience in terms of the facilities? Whether you have the.

For sure, space is a big challenge for our district. We are a smaller district and trying to find classrooms. I have been very, very strategic with principals, our facilities Department, trying to find any space. So because expansion is coming, so it is a challenge.

And could you highlight what are the best examples of why our existing, say, k through five classes are inadequate for TK?

That's a good question. A lot of our schools, at least in West Sacramento, were not built for this many students. So a lot of housing developments have come in the past 20 years and filled up these spaces. So we are out of space. A lot of expansion and growth with families.

So it's overall out of space rather than predict.

That is correct. And then now we've added the TK. And TK is not just. We can't just put those two anywhere. We want to have bathrooms in or close by and playgrounds that are close by. So it's a bit of a more unique situation.

What about LAUSD?

I'd say we go through some of the same challenges, but not as many. I think for us it's going to may sound odd, but sometimes the bathrooms don't have small enough toilets. So we want to make sure that we bring in smaller toilets, fixtures and furnishings. I think were okay because a lot of the classroom furniture and things we can alter. But sometimes those things like restrooms can be an issue. That's probably the biggest challenge.

So given that I'm from LA, I'm more familiar with LAUSD, but given the workforce and the facility shortage, overall challenges, are you still on track toward accommodating all of the demand for the full implementation of universal TK?

So, yeah, we are. I think we're in a good place. The other part of it with our. We're also a direct contractor for state preschool programs, so we have a lot of space. And I think some of the things around FRPM eligibility around. If an early enrollment program is full, you can refer them to an early education program. Those changes in statutes have really helped us serve all four year olds.

So when we look at all four year olds, even besides our TK programs, we're close to or we're just over 26,000 kids. So it definitely helps that families have an option. So that UPK umbrella has been a good thing for us.

All right, if I can add just from CDE, I have fuller remarks for the TK facilities panel. But just to affirm that while there are a majority of leas report having space, I think you have to think about the condition of the space and speaking to the bathrooms.

Bathrooms being located in classrooms is really important or very close to it to kind of just prevent disruptions to the learning environment as well as the problem proximity of a TK classroom or even a kindergarten classroom close to where parents might drop their children off, pick them up, or where buses may drop off or pick up as well.

Okay. Bus drop offs.

Staying with the CDE. Miss. Is it Doctor Neville? Is it Miss Neville mentioned earlier a statistic. I wasn't clear if I wrote it down correctly, but was it 8.5% to 11.5% of eligible three year olds are enrolled in UPK? Correct? We previously had. Prior data we had was eight and a half percent of eligible three year old children were enrolled, enrolled in the California State preschool program. Given some changes to policy in the last budget year, we've been able to.

And the shift to expanding four year old access to TK, we're seeing more three year olds enrolled. And so we have that 11.5%, I believe, is the figure she quoted. All right. And overall, I mean, in terms of this balancing act that we're trying to strike of achieving our goals for universal preschool, while at the same time not undercutting, undermining our quality childcare industry, what is the overall response in the communities, either in Washington or in LA Unified or CDE statewide, in terms of.

I mean, is it generally the families in your communities are seeing the school opportunities as being better or worse or, you know, I mean, it seems like they are choosing to send their four year olds to the universal TK programs, which I assume is the reason why the childcare industry is concerned about the loss of the four year olds. But is that a correct assessment?

At least in Washington in West Sac, the parents have been very happy with the option of having the TK at their other children's schools, so they don't have to make multiple stops to drop off. That's a big thing. And then also the fact that we're providing the nine hour day through ELOP has been very helpful to working families.

Okay. Yeah, I'm going to echo the sentiments of Miss Atabaki, because we do see that parents, when they understand the choices, they're very appreciative of it. We do still have quite a few students who are in our state subsidized programs because they need the full year, full day programs and an elementary calendar may not work for them. So having that option for both sides has been a big thing, and it's been very positively received by our families. Okay.

And of course, we'll hear from the child care provider's perspective afterwards. But I just wanted to take advantage, Mister chair this opportunity and Miss Gable, because you know the history better than I do. I just wanted to address the LA unified, you know, you know, raising the issue of the TK penalties. So I was not part of the conversations. And so I may be getting myself in trouble here.

But I'm just going to share what, you know, what I know of the issue and what seems to make sense to me, and if anyone can fill in the gaps of my understanding, I would appreciate it. But the only reason, from what I've heard and understand, the only reason why we have the penalties is because it was part of the deal between the expansion of the universal transitional kindergarten and the childcare providers.

But to penalize our school districts for expanding, doing what they're supposed to do and to be penalized for even some of their schools going over the staffing ratios seems to be contradictory to our commitment, our effort to move forward with the overall access for universal transitional kindergarten. And so, you know, I also had an opportunity to meet with Superintendent Carvalho and school board Members from LAUSD yesterday.

You know, I mean, even proposing what I thought was a compromise of like a proportional penalty for only for the schools that may be over the staffing ratio rather than penalizing the entire school district. I mean, I haven't heard a rational policy argument to justify the penalties. So I just want to put that out there. Would welcome any, any comments or feedback going forward. Thank you, Mister chair.

Thank you. I heard also some questions about facilities, so we do have a panel scheduled to talk about that. I think it's a really important conversation to have about, because it's not just can you fit the children into the right facility, facility, but is it the right facility? And that requires. It's not just a basic classroom, as we all know.

So we need to talk about that because that does lead to the quality of what we are hoping to accomplish, as does, by the way, the ratios. Right? Again, our consultant here has some time, and I've learned a lot about the evolution of the reasoning for UTK because I've had a lot of questions about, okay, are we just doing this to say we're doing this just to be really honest? That's what I've asked.

Or are we doing this in a way that's actually benefiting children and allowing them to grow and expand their minds in the ways and develop in the ways that are appropriate and the models of which I think this UT California's UTK program is based off of talks about some ratios that are actually smaller than this in terms of students to instructional leaders, teachers.

And so I welcome a conversation, and I think we should have a conversation as this fully gets implemented and we have some learned lessons as to are we implementing this the right way and not get accustomed to what we're doing today and just say, well, that's the way we've done it and we're gonna continue to do it. We are early enough in this new educational opportunity where we should be analyzing it and course correcting and learning from the lessons of the practitioners.

And so I think we have to have that conversation. That is an even bigger conversation. I'm hopeful, Mister chair, with your education Committee and our Subcommitee, we probably should spend some time on that and further discussing those issues and obviously the issue of the ratios as well. So we will do that. But thank you to this panel. We're going to move on to the next.

Our next issue is child care and preschool funding rates oversight, and our Subcommitee number two on human services chair will be back soon, but I will take the opportunity to introduce the panel. And certainly no surprise that one of the biggest panels on this, we have 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6. 7 folks that I can count at the moment, eight will be talking on this particular issue on the single rate system for funding our child care providers.

The panel will provide us with an update on the implementation of the cost of care, plus rate supplements from 23-24 Budget act and the development process for an alternative methodology, which I think we have all heard about over the last year, in particular for alternative methodology for funding all childcare and preschool program rates.

While the movement to a single rate is supposed to make the funding system more straightforward for everybody to implement, and it aligns to service standards for children and families, the cost of care, the transition is complicated and faces a cliff ahead in federal funds alone. So we must be ready to make this major priority for the 2526 budget. It's never too early to start and I'm glad that you are all here to help us get started on this conversation.

I think we're going to start off with the Legislative Analyst Office and then let's follow the agenda, because in this case there's a few Un, some are sitting up and some are others. We'll do the Legislative Analyst Office, DSS, CDE SEIU Childcare Resource Center, and then Parent Voices. That works for everybody. So let's get started.

Jackie Barossa with the Legislative Analyst Office. We were asked to present on three items. One is just provide a General overview of how providers are paid, second being progress made towards a single rate structure, and the third being what rate adjustments have we done in the interim towards that single rate structure. So in terms of how providers are paid, historically there have been two different provider rates.

We have the regional market rate, which traditionally has been for voucher based programs, which is based off of a survey of how much do child care providers charge for child care services? And it varies by county, but then also time periods. There's a daily rate, weekly rate, monthly rate, and then the second provider rate that we have is the standard reimbursement rate, which is traditionally for direct contract programs and that is a fixed per child daily reimbursement rate.

That is the same for all providers across the state. Additionally, providers, they receive family fees. Recently, as a part of last year's budget, we capped family fees at 1% of a family's income, but then also limited it to to families with incomes 75% above the state median income. If their income falls below that, they're exempt from family fees. There's also family copays.

So to the extent that a voucher payment rate is less than what a private child care provider is charging, the family would be responsible for paying the difference. So those three things is how a provider is paid. Moving on to progress made progress made by the state in moving towards a single rate structure recently, the state has taken many actions.

In 21-22 the state decided to move all providers to the regional market rate, or RMR, but they would be allowed to continue to receive the standard reimbursement rate to the extent that that was higher. At the same time, the Legislature passed language that established two workgroups to make recommendations for the implementation of a single reimbursement rate structure. One workgroup is a joint endeavor between the state and the childcare union.

The other workgroup consists of a mix of providers, including center based providers that are not represented by the union, and both of these work groups are working in parallel of one another to capture again both the representative and non represented provider perspective. Recently, both workgroups have recommended moving towards a single rate structure that reflects the actual cost of care.

In 23-24 as a part of the collective bargaining agreement, the Legislature required the Department of Social Services, in collaboration with the Department of Education, to develop and conduct an alternative rate methodology in order to move to a single rate structure. The alternative methodology would be based off of a new cost study and a cost estimate model that again generally reflects the actual cost of care.

And by actual cost of care, it's looking at what does the state require, health standards, quality standards, safety standards, but then also looking at the wage for providers and trying to create a rate that encompasses what do we need to pay providers in order to meet those state requirements, but then also to pay providers? In a survey done last year, a living wage the Department is currently working with. Again, both work groups in order to develop definitions and inputs that would inform the alternative rate methodology.

Most recently, the Administration did reach consensus with the Joint Labor Management Committee, that is, the workgroup that consists of the state and the union on base and enhanced rate definitions for the alternative rate, and the Department is currently working with another workgroup to reach similar definitions for mostly non represented providers. Per statute, the Department shall submit to the Federal Government the necessary information to support a single rate structure using this alternative methodology by July 1, 2024.

This would not necessarily be the rates themselves, but would rather reflect the General framework of the alternative methodology. That's our understanding. And then, within 60 days of the federal approval of this General alternative methodology framework, the Department then shall provide the Legislature with an outline of implementation components, but then also will reopen collective bargaining with the unions to start talking about the various inputs that could inform the actual rate values under this methodology.

Overall, the Federal Government requires that the states determine payment rates based on alternative methodology by July 12025 and submit an implementation timeline. So in terms of the timing of when rates would be based off of the alternative methodology, this ultimately depends on the results of collective bargaining, but then also the annual budget process in terms of if and how much the state will appropriate to support these alternative rates through future budgets.

Lastly, touching on rate adjustments that have occurred in the interim, as we work towards a single rate structure. Again, through the most recent collective bargaining agreement, the state is providing a temporary rate supplement to providers that is set to expire at the end of June 2025.

So to the extent that the alternative rate methodology is not adopted by then, rates would decrease back to normal levels, meaning they would go back to the 75th percentile of the 2018 regional market rate or the standard reimbursement rate based off of most recent estimates, the current rate supplement costs $400 million annually. So then that would go away, which represents about 5% of the total childcare budget. That's the end of my comments.

Thank you. Our next panelist, please.

Good morning. Kim Johnson, California Department of Social Services thank you, chair and Member. The LAO just did an outstanding job of going over the next steps and process and the process to date. So I'll just underscore a few areas here.

Again, fundamentally, what we are trying to shift from is a surveying structure that looks at what families can pay and bases our rate structure based on that information to a structure that looks at the true cost of care based on what programs need to provide the supports and services. Fundamentally, that's the alternative methodology that the Federal Government allows for either of those options going forward. We have, through the adoption of Assembly Bill 116, Legislature and Governor committed to the use of that alternative methodology.

And again, Miss Barocio just outlined a number of steps we've taken to in the interim. As we're looking at that, operationalizing that alternative going forward. I'll just again underscore a couple of things. The ways in which we are engaging the public and community. That's obviously our kind of first step.

Number one priority in getting input as we go forward in terms of the help of the design of the survey itself and in getting outreach to make sure that the survey reached as many programs as possible and Members of the workforce to respond to those kind of components. We have shared. Just to underscore, we have shared the outcome of the results that the Lao referenced between child care providers united and the state.

That is posted publicly on our website that was submitted to the Legislature on March 22 just about a month ago, and speaks to then our process steps that we'll be taking to get this alternative methodology approved and also the base elements, the structure of this new alternative methodology that we've gone forward with. So we are next steps submitting our state plan to the Federal Government Administration for children and families by July of this year.

That submission will include the status of the proposed alternative methodology completed activities to date, the timeline for completing data collection as the Federal Government requires a certain timeframe for data collection and and the updates on establishing the new rates we expect to rehear back from the Federal Government in the fall of this year.

And then, as again, the Lao outlined pursuant to our agreement in our current MOU with child care providers united within 90 days of that approval is when the state and CCPU will reopen our MOU related to rates in the cost of care, plus rate for good faith negotiations to restructure current subsidy rates and associated funding. We also, again, will engage the non represented workforce in programs and have that concurrent information to set for the rest of the field. Would also just note that the LAO outlined.

So then when does the actual new structure go into place? The reason that we don't have a date certain for that is because as we're going through this process and we land on those structures, we'll need to really look at regulatory and policy guidance needed, contractor training and updates to data systems, the actual automation that allows the issuance of payments, and that will be the information we'll provide at that time to actually establish the rates again, long time in the making.

Part of the master plan that I just referenced, many work groups have been working on. What you heard is a fairly complex system that we've had for a very, very long time. So we're excited about this change and opportunity to really have a rate driven by the cost of providing the great services to children and families across California. Thank you.

Thank you so much. Virginia Early with the California Department of Education on behalf of State Superintendent of Public Instruction Tony Thurmond. So CDE has been very closely collaborating with DSS in every step of the process to ensure that expertise about the California State preschool program is included as the new rate structure is developed, as it will apply to the California State preschool program as well as child care programs.

We're really happy that this work is ongoing because we regularly hear from our contractors that the low rate in state preschool is making it challenging for them to recruit and retain qualified staff as well as to recover from the pandemic's impacts on enrollment. While one time cost of care plus rates are helpful, contractors have shared that it is challenging for them to increase salaries with funds that are not ongoing. To truly increase salaries requires an ongoing commitment to funding increases.

As both LAO and DSS have mentioned, we've been working closely with DSS starting back in 2022 on a rate reform and quality workgroup and then continuing on with a joint labor-management Committee and the new the sort of rate and quality advisory panel that's meeting now to incorporate centers into that discussion as well as other voices in the coming months, CDE is focused on ensuring that, in alignment with the recommendation from the rate and quality workgroup, that any rate structure capture the true cost of care, that it reflects the cost of California State Preschool Program requirements, which in some cases are different from DSS childcare programs and also the voucher and the private pay centers and family child care homes.

This may mean that rates for CDE and DSS programs might need to be different to capture these differentiated requirements.

While the final rates structure and the rates themselves are still up in the air, we did want to highlight, in line with what Director Johnson just highlighted, that CDE will not be able to make changes to data systems immediately, and the timeline associated with data system changes, as well as the additional CDE resources needed to accomplish these changes will really depend on the exact nature of the changes required by the agreement, which are unknown at this time.

So, for example, if the final rate structure requires data that the current data system does not collect collect, it may be necessary for CDE to create a new fiscal data system rather than adapting one the state already has, which would take additional time and resources thank you so much and happy to answer questions at the appropriate time.

Thank you. Our next speaker please.

Kimberly Rosenberger with SEIU here on behalf of CCPU, which is our child care provider united, which is UDW, and SEIU collaboration. In terms of the progress we've made, it is true that we've landed on those elements based off of the most recent P-five survey, which had information on providers, community status, families using care where children are cared for, and those recommendations established a base rate element, how to apply them to title 22, to title five, and family, friend and neighborhood.

It developed a list of variables that we think should be taken into account when figuring out the actual true cost of care, including benefits, hours of operation, training needs, family engagement, but no actual values were attached to any of these factors. There's mention of one time cost versus ongoing. There are three enhancement factors, nontraditional hours, special needs, transportation. Those are crucial to supporting our current childcare structure.

But in the elements, you'll see a lot of tbds, and that was necessary for us to meet the timeline needed so that we can get this implemented federally. Those don't need to be finalized, but we would really encourage, and I think what we're hearing is those need to be discussed immediately in order for us to stay on track. So I kind of want to emphasize two things. The workgroup that we're working in parallel. I don't know if we would have consensus on that.

And the child care infrastructure. We have worked really hard to have meaningful relationships with our partners in ECE, especially centers. We do not have enough providers to care for the children that have those needs and for the families that need us. We cannot have infighting. And so this structure, it's really important that we're not the only ones heard and there's an afterthought.

So we would encourage that when that other workgroup is utilized, that they get to have meaningful engagement so that there isn't that kind of infighting where we're carrying the weight and burden, because we do consider them our partners and we need to all work together. But we know we're working on a timeline, so we acknowledge that there has to be a little bit of flexibility. Hence the tbds, which is the outstanding questions that we, as CCP, you have about the implementation.

There is so much wiggle room in this new alternative methodology that we needed to ensure meeting the federal timeline, but they can be discussed before the reopener, and they should be discussed in order for us to meaningfully bargain and to do it sincerely. So we would like to discuss, like what is it needed to empower the state agencies to implement, to have the proper transitions to finalize those cost of care factors. It doesn't mean that that will determine what the contract is, what the costs are.

Those will be negotiated, but there are numbers that can be attached, real numbers that are meaningful. Those cost factors are something that we're ready to discuss and we think we can. We also have some concerns about the timeline and the transition. We already just heard recently about a waiver on the federal requirements for the timely payments.

And that just gives us a little bit of pause because if we're waving things that can be implemented with discussion, this transition means we need to start having those conversations so we're not kicking the can down the road. The flag we heard and is why we're pushing so much to have these discussions now is because if we fall back to the 201875% rmrs, we will lose our child care providers. That is a catastrophe that we cannot have and we would like to avoid.

So we do have questions on how we are going to address those, what the state agencies need to get those their computer systems up to date, including the cost factors. And we have recommended some next steps that we think will help move things along, including laying out dates through trailer Bill with reports to the Legislature and completion of the assumption of tables for cost of care factors requiring reporting date mechanisms, estimating cost of care model implementation.

And then there's federal recommendations that we think we should incorporate now. And we're recommending these steps not because we think it'll help move things along, but because we need it to move along. Because when we get to next year, year and we're bargaining on the budget, we need to have all of these already laid out. And we need the state agencies to be empowered to do those decision making and implementation needed. So we want to continue working as partners.

And in doing that, we recognize that they need additional support from the Legislature to have the authority to move forward. So we would really just underscore that it is time sensitive in this legislative year. It's not necessarily budgeting out for the next contract, it's giving the authority and mechanisms needed for those state agencies.

Thank you. Appreciate your testimony. Please proceed.

Good morning, everyone. My name is Donna Sneeringer. I'm the Vice President and Chief Strategy Officer with the Child Care Resource Center. We are a large multi service child and family services organization, and we currently administer nearly all of the different subsidized payment programs with contracts with both Department of Social Services and the Department of Education and have been long time participants in this reimbursement rate discussion with our partners.

Just want to thank the Committee for taking the time and for your invitation to provide testimony on rate reform. I'm going to start by restating what you all know. Child care providers have been historically undervalued and underpaid. Caring for children was largely the work of women, often women of color, and the compensation has never fully honored the skill, training and patience needed to perform this work.

This critical labor force, which provides services to working families, allowing them to participate in our economy, is currently facing a historic shortage of workers. Hiring has become nearly impossible as the next generation of workers make choices to enter higher paying professions, and that's especially true of those who have higher education and training. A newly released Public Policy Institute of California report on Child care workforce shows the average wage of a worker at $18 per hour.

Right now, fast food workers earn 20 and people are not taking these jobs. We have an urgency here that I think really cannot be underscored enough. Advocates in the Legislature have been working well over a decade to address this crisis. Trust me, I've been at every workgroup and meeting every year, and after years of discussion, we had our first legislative Bill introduced to the Assembly in 2014. That was a decade ago.

This was followed by three consecutive workgroup recommendations around rate reform, the first funded by first five California with their white paper in 2018, then the Assembly Blue Ribbon Commission report in 2019, and the master plan. As stated by Director Johnson. Everyone agreed we need to move forward on this. And this was followed by many different legislative efforts.

As stated by many of my fellow panelists, the Administration and Legislature have made historic investments to shore up the childcare industry, but largely the dollars for wages and reimbursement have been allocated through stipends and short term solutions. It's important to note that the reimbursement deal we agreed upon last year only provided for the two years of the contract period and also was funded in part by the loss of the cost of living adjustment, which was owed to the rest of the infrastructure in the system.

So we were taking from one part of the system to shore up another. As Director Johnson mentioned, we are on the precipice of the next step to submit a plan. I can hardly believe we're so close. We really are. And this plan goes to the Administration for Children and Families, but our work is far from complete. The LAO and Director reviewed the goals, so I won't go into that.

And DSS did submit a plan to the Legislature as mentioned the rate and quality advisory panel, which is the current iteration of the rate work group that is never ending, did meet on April 8 and reviewed the first round of agreements that came from the Joint Labor Management Committee agreement. There were some major concerns raised by panel Members and the public related to many of those to be determined items, as well as some new things we had never seen before.

The base rate elements for wage determination now include use of the Bureau of Labor Statistics numbers for child care wages as one of the elements which could be used for setting the base. The reason we're worried about this is we know it reflects current pay and we know pay is inadequate. Using this measure will artificially deflate the base from the start, and in reality, it's just another way to pay based on the current market.

And the whole point of this was to get away from paying like we pay in the current market. So there were a lot of concerns raised about that. There were also other alternatives, and I think it's important for the Legislature to watch very closely which of those alternatives gets picked up in the reports back to you.

The base elements also are only currently the JLMC agreement, which means a huge number of our programs, our child care centers have not really seen what the framework for their reimbursement will look like. The process with CCPU has been going on for about six months. There has been no real engagement with the center based population going parallel to that outside of the rate advisory group, which has been much a report back in conversation.

But there still is work to be done to make sure that we are covering the costs. In California, both publicly contracted and private centers receive subsidy payments. Their business models contain different pressures from home based care, and it's really important that we get this right. It also appears that, as Kim mentioned, there is a lot of work to be done, and I don't know that we have a tight enough time.

We have a very tight timeline and not enough framework to make sure we don't get behind. We've got some baked in delays behind when the report is submitted to ACF and when we start negotiations. We believe we really need to start now. And I just want to underscore that without a new agreement, on July 1 of 2025, the existing JLMC agreement and contract with CCPU expires, and rates will revert back to prior reimbursement.

This will result in a 25% to 30% cut to what we pay our child care providers, and as previously stated, they won't make it. We can't hire as it is, and that is something we have to avoid. So based on all that I've learned over the years on this conversation, I want to make some recommendations to what we need to do.

First, I want to underscore we need to start now at nailing down these to be determined elements and making sure that we are ready and we're moving forward. I think it's important that the Legislature set clear statutory deadlines and report backs so that we stay on time and don't get crunched up at the budget. As the budget season moves forward next year, it's critical to ensure the full system is involved in rate determination, not just those represented by CCPU.

The CCPU partners that we have and the private childcare community have been working hand in hand. We have advocated for this together, but we cannot only have decisions made in that one area and leave so many of our center based providers behind.

We also would recommend that you consider looking at the current dollar investment and creating some base funding level equivalent to the current rate plus the care cost, cost plus stipend to ensure there isn't a reduction to the already inadequate rates, a safety net, so to speak. So that if we do run out of time, we still have a plan. We really encourage a transition plan. We know these things are complicated. They take time.

And the more clarity we have around the direction so that we're all rowing in the right direction would be good and develop a policy framework for rate reform. To pair with this, some policies to consider would be de-linking subsidy rates from private pay parents and what they can afford and implementation of the new payment rules outlined in the recent recommendations from the Administration of Children and Families.

Lastly, we all know this is a very challenging budget environment and that full implementation of new alternative rates will take multiple years. This isn't going to happen overnight. I think we're all very clear eyed about that. But please work with us to ensure that the decisions that are made are creating a visionary system which will build the childcare industry in California for generations to come and not stifle our plan because of a difficult budget climate. Thank you very much. I'm happy to answer any questions and appreciate your time.

Thank you. Next panelist, please.

Good morning. My name is Liliana Camacho. I am a leader with Parent Voice of Santa Clara. I've lived in Mountain View for 20 years. I am a mom of four kids. My oldest will be turning nine on Sunday. I have three little ones, Mia is three, David's two, and Kayla is 14 months. When I had Kayla, I went on maternity leave for my past job.

By the time I was ready to go back to work, I was forced to resign due to the fact I didn't have childcare for her. The reason why it's so important for me for my kids to have childcare goes back when I was a kid. I never went to preschool and when I was in second grade, I got assigned to English Language Development or ELD classes.

I didn't get reclassified until I was in high school and I couldn't take any electives because I had to take double English. I had to take two buses to get to my high school. I was bullied for my English and it was trauma to me and it made me hate school and want to quit. Meanwhile, my little sister went to preschool and reclassified eld when she was in third grade. Her experience was different than mine.

When my daughter Mia turned three, I was excited for her to start school, but living in Mountain View, it is really hard to get affordable childcare. I have been on childcare voucher waiting list for two years and even had to reapply because paperwork got lost. According to mychildcarefund.org, there are seven providers in the entire city who accept vouchers. Seven providers in a City of 80,000 people. The only free option I was offered was the was one free preschool in Mountain View through the school district.

But it's only 3 hours a day. That doesn't help parents who have to work. 3 hours is better than nothing and my daughter's education comes first. So I took it. I couldn't make any appointments. I couldn't do any work for my part time job in 3 hours. Some days I didn't have time to make food for myself because I was so focused on the kids. I only worried that they would have the same struggles I did in school. It is not just mountain view.

Other cities are in similar situations. While waiting for vouchers, I started search for subsidized child care centers. I've driven to five different cities across two counties making calls or visiting at least 20 child care programs. I didn't know if they took vouchers or if they had any subsidized thoughts. They all had a long waiting list that I had to apply in person to get even get on. I spent countless hours ending up with no childcare. Parents are definitely impacted by low provider rates.

Providers cannot afford to take vouchers and stay in business, and centers cannot hire more teachers to serve more children or have to charge higher copayments to parents. This impacts me personally when I had to pay a copayment of 400 a month for my oldest daughter to have full childcare, even though I was barely making any money. Then this past February, I got a call from a subsidized program in Sunnyvale that I had space for all three of my younger kids. I was in shock.

I had to pinch myself, double checked the number to make sure it wasn't a scam. I felt like I was getting a fever. I was so overwhelmed I cried tears of joy to finally get this phone call. I've been waiting for three years. It turns out that the relief was temporary. Although Mia and David have been in childcare since February, Kayla still remains on the waiting list. I was informed that they have the space for her, but they just don't have enough teachers.

Kayla is waiting because we don't pay early educators what they're worth. At least I was able to get care for Mia and David and change my schedule to full time. If my if the old fee scheduled was in place, we should have been paying 480 every month for full childcare. Keeping that money means we can pay for Cassie's tutoring. Seeing her do well in school has helped my own healing in process. I don't have to tell my daughter no, we can't do that.

Every time she wants to do something that costs us little money, she's already planning vacations for us. Now that she knows and I'm able to work full time, we're able to invest that money back into our children. We can even try to save a bit. And it's nice not to feel that we're always broke, no matter how hard we work. It makes me sad that even though I found childcare, my kids don't get to go to school where we live.

Trust me, I am grateful to have gotten a spot, but it's nearly 30 minutes from home and it would have been better for me if I had childcare options in Mountain View, the city where I lived. I grew up in Mountain View. It was my home. Mountain View is closed and I don't want to leave. It just feels families like mine are getting pushed out because it's too expensive.

When we have a true cost care model and more subsidized child care spaces, I hope to see 100 subsidized providers in Mountain View, not just seven. We need hundreds of thousands across the state. It's time we value our early educators and give families more options to choose childcare when and where they need it.

We're asking this Committee to work with parents and providers to pass a final budget that includes 20,000 new subsidized spaces for families and takes real steps towards the cost of care model for providers. When parents and providers and children thrive, we all win. Thank you.

Any more questions? Okay, my bad. What's next? Okay.

Did you have any questions that you want to ask the panel?

What improvements on the childcare funding rate system does the alternative pathology seek to address?

Thank you, Assembly Member, for that question. Kim Johnson, social services. So again, fundamentally, the rate surveys, the regional market rate surveys that we've conducted to date, historically in California, surveys essentially what the parent can afford, and that's how we set our rate structures based on those differences geographically throughout the state and other components and program types. So family, child care, center based, et cetera. This alternative methodology allows us to still survey programs in the workforce, but related to the cost, cost of care. So that's the fundamental shift in terms of the kind of contextual basis by which we're setting rates in the structure.

May I also, at least for CCPU, a really important is the recognition of family, friend and neighbors. Those are providers that are in the community. While they're not licensed, they often take in a number of children. They have been the largest provider care as we've expanded slots. And so the new methodology includes enhancement factors such as non traditional hours, special need and transportation.

Those are where we see the greatest need for families that are often providers aren't taking those children because the cost value is so Low that they simply can't and continue providing service to others. So those additional considerations, we think, will improve areas that desperately need additional care.

I have one more question. Will the 25-26 January budget include a proposal to shift to the alternative mythology?

Yeah, hopefully.

Okay, I'll take that.

I think one of the things we underscored today and others commented on is that in order to do so, there needs to be a lot of conversation happening right now, hence this instead of an affirmative.

Yes.

So we would like to see that next year, but we know that we have to continue conversations, and also we think that the state agencies may need additional resources, so we want to be supportive in those requests.

Well, obviously, we need to ask the Administration and make sure that we have you covered as well. If it's appropriate, I'd like to make a couple of. oh, go ahead. I'm sorry.

Tamar Weber, the Department of Finance. So the sunset or extension of the cost of care plus funding level will be subject to collective bargaining for CCP representative providers and deliberations as part of, part of the next budget development for non CCPU represented providers. But the Administration wants to kind of underscore that we are committed to moving to the cost of care alternative methodology, and the opening of collective bargaining will begin before the expiration of the current agreement. So before that July 1, 2025 date.

Do you want to make a statement or.

Yeah, I have a statement if it's okay. First of all, it's a sad day for me because my best friend was Delaine Easton, and I think she made me be here today because this essential was such an important thing that she always wanted as children to be taken care of. So I'm honored to be here to have a few comments from the Legislative Women's Caucus. You know, the Legislative Women's Caucus has consistently prioritized childcare for nearly two decades.

The focus is largely because of the knowledge that child care is provided by women workers, predominantly women of color, and is critical to the economic success of all working women. Since 2014, there have been legislative attempts to reform the reimbursement rate system for California child care providers.

In April 2019, the Assembly released a Blue Ribbon Commission report which highlighted the need to make significant reforms to reimbursement to ensure child care workers are paid a fair wage and to reaffirm that child care workers have been historically marginalized, underpaid and under resourced in the last two consecutive budgets. Agreements the Legislature came to agreements to move forward toward the adoption of a single reimbursement rate and the transition to an alternative methodology.

The methodology would be based on the actual cost of care rather than the tuition charged by the private market. In addition, the first two contracts negotiated by child care providers united there were agreements to move forward the adoption of the new reimbursement methodology. This conversation has been going on for a decade, and it is time to move past planning and toward the actual implementation to shore up our depleted and shrinking childcare workforce.

Even as we continue to drag out the process, the inadequate rate structure perpetuates these challenges. Programs struggle to hire teachers and aids so entire ECE classrooms are sitting dark, not serving Low income children who are on waiting lists for care. The reimbursement rates are so low that providers offer 33% less than in and out starting hourly wage at $20. So where we stand now, the report prepared by CDSS and presented to the Legislature on March 222024 reiterates existing knowledge and existing agreements.

The joint labor management agreements toward the development of a base rate are a start, but large numbers of the child care field were not included in these discussions. The agreements are only based on cost of family child care homes, which is very different business model than the center based care. With little opportunity to see a meaningful change before 2025. It is our obligation to ensure that what is adopted will finally secure equitable and livable wages for all of our child care workforce.

And I guarantee that investments will be made to finally provide relief to the struggling group of women workers. Thank you very much for having me today. I think she's looking down at me saying, keep fighting for the kids. Thank you.

Thank you so much, Assemblymember, for those remarks. And again, the long term leadership that the Women's caucus has provided on this issue, we've got to get this right. Thank you for your leadership.

Thank you very much.

My number one concern is, as we begin to, there's not very many opportunities for systems to update rates to make update the system. And once that update is complete, the likelihood that that will change anytime soon, I'm not sure if I might still be around.

I believe that, as Assemblymember Aguiar Curry has indicated as well, that we have got to make sure that the adjustments in rates truly reflects all of the cost that it takes to provide care for our young people, whether they're in home based, whether they're center based, or even whether they are a three year old on a TK program on the school campus.

And one of the things that I know I will have a natural negative reaction to is if we say that a program on a school campus should have a higher rate than a home based, because if we don't truly cover the cost care, then it makes no sense to think we can expand the number of slots because they're all directly connected, because we have to pay people what they deserve to be paid.

And it is atrocious for the people who are literally responsible for our most precious. Most people are paid the least, right? And so a few questions just about in terms of how we're thinking about funding and all those things, is the Administration committed to funding progress toward increased funding by provider as a part of the new methodology adoption?

I'll start with that chair. Thank you for the question. I think, again, a couple points I would make, as I referenced earlier in the panel, that the master plan's recommendation to move to single reimbursement rate structure, I think I shared with you the range of the cost associated with the overall implementation, not just the rate component, was two to $12 billion.

We recognize that within this conversation that we're having in shifting from serving related to the cost that families pay to the cost of care, that is also likely to have some significant cost pressures. It will cost more. And again, it's through the negotiations and conversations where we'll have more clarity about how much more. Again, I think we had some additional, I'll refer to the LAO, I think last year did a report, too, that also had that number in the billions of dollars.

So again, we'll be looking at, to your point, a couple of points I want to make in response to your remarks. One, the Federal Government requires us to assess the adequacy of our rates once every three years. So there is a requirement by the state to continue doing the survey and reassess as we move through time.

But we are expecting that this shift in how we're looking at that cost model, influencing the rate structure that we have to cost additional dollars, likely high in the billions of dollars.

So then when we negotiate, and I've shared this in prior testimonies where we are today, to all points being made by my fellow panelists, to the point that we're going to identify that we need to be, there's certainly going to be a great delta there that we'll have to then identify together the Governor and Legislature how much we will be increasing each year to move towards what the cost of care is.

So I think my question then to the Department of Finance is when should we see a proposal From the Governor on how we're going to address those costs, that Delta, or you're leaving it up to the Legislature for our great ideas?

Tamara Webber, Department of Finance well, as always, the budget agreement is a shared project that we work together with the Legislature. The funding of the actual cost of care alternative methodology, that's something that will be determined in the next or in the next few budget cycles as it actually gets rolled out. So we certainly can't commit to any like funding right now because those will be part of future budget development talks.

But again, I do want to underscore that we are committed to transitioning to this cost of care alternative methodology. We've invested a lot of resources already to get to move in that direction, as the Director outlined earlier. That's, I think, what we can say right now.

But the Governor doesn't have a few budget cycles left. So my question is that, matter of fact, I think he only has two budget cycles left. So will we get the job done within the next two budget cycles? Is anything more than that? Is passing the buck to someone else? Any thoughts of what you are thinking in terms of making sure we get this done within this Governor's Administration?

Well, as the Director mentioned, we are submitting the plan this coming July, and so that means that we'll be working towards figuring out implementation and determining funding levels in what's going to be next year's budget year 24-25 or 25-26.

Well, I just want to make sure that this budget Subcommitee goes on record in ensuring that it is our expectation that we figure this out within this governor's Administration and so that we can make sure that we have a stable system and we can have predictability for the long term because we still have service deserts that we have to take care of. We still have a whole lot of other things we have to take care of.

So if we don't get the funding stream taken care of, we can't fully plan for future out years. Right. And so I just want to make sure that we are clear on that. Could an annual reversion account similar to Proposition 98, accounting for childcare funding, provide better transparency for funding state commitments versus annual expenditures basically serve as an ECA rainy day Fund? Any thoughts on that?

Tamara Webber, Department of Finance we're going to have fun. We're just, you know, so the Governor's Budget does not include a proposal for an annual reversion account for child care, and we don't have any specific feedback on that idea at the moment. But we are happy to discuss a proposal with the Legislature and legislative staff. So reach out.

Fantastic. You probably should look forward to seeing that proposal from my Select, Select Committee. It's actually Budget Committee. Budget Committee two. Subcommitee two. And obviously, the idea is that, again, I cannot underscore just how critical it is to have a strong, robust childcare system in California because it's the solution to so many other issues that California has to face and solve. Right. I'm not directing this to you, by the way. We're just, we have a connection now.

So you know that we have got to make sure that certainly a rainy day with a Fund is certainly, I think, would do good for the long term stability, especially as we see the ups and downs of California's economy. There's no way we're going to be fixing that. That's just what we have to be prepared for and so look forward to us making that proposal. We doing it this year or next year? This year, this year. So great debates to come. What is the average family copay with low rates? Anyone have an answer to that question?

I'm glad to follow up with the Committee on that. I don't have that at my fingertips, but glad to follow up.

Okay. This has certainly been, and as you see, Members are going in and out. This is a crazy week for everyone, but we felt like we needed to make sure that even though we're all going in and out, does not reflect the seriousness in which we are taking this issue. It's just the cost of business of all these bills floating around all over here, around this building. But I want to thank this panel very much for your participation.

I want to thank all of you and looking forward to working with you to continue to make progress. Thank you all very much. We'll move on to issue number four, childcare and preschool quality improvement and workforce support. And I believe first off, we'll have LAO start us off, and you may begin when you are ready.

Jackie Barocio Legislative Analyst Office in terms of issue number four, I just wanted to flag that, just provide a brief overview of the Federal Government requirements. Specifically, the Federal Government requires that states spend at least 12% of federal child care development Fund dollars on quality improvement activity. The current budget assumes that the state will receive a total of $1 billion of these 1 billion of the federal Child Care Development Fund Dollars, of which about 160 million would need to be spent on quality improvement activities.

In our recent budget analysis, we also flagged that there's a potential for an additional $10 million of additional federal funds that would need to be directed towards quality improvement activities. And this is just the result of actual award letters coming in higher, but then also recent increase to total CCDF funding levels. Historically, while the Legislature has approved the dollars associated with quality improvement activities, the Administration would decide how to spend these dollars outside of the budget process without legislative input.

So in our recent analysis, we just suggest that the Legislature require the Administration to submit a draft of their CCDF child care development Fund quality plan every may revision as a part of the budget process so that the Legislature can provide input on what activities are funded, similar to the level of oversight that we have on other childcare items. Thank you.

I was going to say good morning, but I think we're in the afternoon. Good afternoon. Doctor Lupe Jaime-Mileham I'm the Deputy Director of the Childcare and Development Division at CDSS. So we appreciate the emphasis on the agenda, on the importance of quality and workforce support. And at CDSS we think it's important to begin by recognizing that quality. Quality means being responsive to the needs of children, families and communities, and quality exists across all settings as emphasized in your agenda.

The Master plan also focuses on the importance of quality and specifically, the master plan highlights supports for children learning and development by emphasizing educators competencies, incentivizing funding, career pathways and implementing supports program standards, as well as enhancing standards and providing pathways for the workforce to advance compensation and competencies. High equity I'm sorry? High quality early learning and care programs meet children and families needs for different reasons, health and safety for example, so including licensures being the foundational base of health and safety and quality.

Positive relationships between that caregiver and that child as well as that relationship with the families. Culturally linguistically inappropriate practices as also competencies, family and community engagement, Inclusive City, especially in the least restricted environments for children with disabilities. Very important.

We are also working towards the preschool development grant to focus on ways to address how quality to must take equity into account when looking and defining quality as both a process as well as an outcome to embed equity in there and recommendations in regards to the importance of equity for outcomes. In terms of supporting quality, we are also doing significant work to support professional development using a systemic approach.

Currently, as referenced in the federal state plan, the workforce and all CCDF funded programs have access to to an array of professional development through different modalities online.

Also in person in the early childhood system, the professional development is available to childcare and development workforce regardless of setting types, and an example of that is the professional development that is embedded both in the quality rating and improvement system QRs, as well as the workforce pathways program sites that don't require programs to be rated in order to participate and access those services. We also offer an array of different quality initiatives that includes publications, online resources and programs to support quality.

In a sense, a participant can utilize these services at their own pace if they would like to be able to continue their professional development too. And then of course, coaching is core to the service and for the professional development and trainings.

There's several examples of professional supports that includes multilingual supports, supports for inclusive classrooms as noted in our state plan, and one of those, for example, is the learning language project, and it focuses on multilingualism and their families through evidence based curriculum, which includes oral language learning strategies.

We're also strengthening the pipeline for workforce into licensed care by investing in programs such as the California Early Childhood Mentor Program, the Child Care Initiative Project, which we reference as SIP, and then of course the child care resource and referral programs, and also the role of the local planning council that provides key data for this work, too. As an example of the investments with SIP allows for investments for payments in terms of capacity building supports as well as greater retention for the workforce.

And then recently, CDSs worked with the California Child Care Resource and referral agencies to develop a set self assessment tool that agencies can implement to look at themselves as quality improvements on programs, guidelines and requirements. CCR&Rs are currently piloting that tool, and the data will assist to continue to refine that tool as we roll it out for implementation in the future. So appreciate the role with co creating it.

Together with our CCR&Rs, we're gathering feedback on quality initiatives on program development supports through the state plan process, and we continue to receive feedback as well as many other spaces.

The state plan process does also support the partnership between the Administration and the Legislator, and we're requested by the state law to share the draft of the state plan within the legislators by April 1 of the year, which we have, and the Legislature has 30 days to provide feedback to that plan, which drives then our investments regarding quality improvements for the next couple years.

With that, again, I want to emphasize that we are pleased to be able to showcase some of our quality and professional development efforts, and at the appropriate time, I'm available to answer any questions. Thank you.

You know, when you use the acronym SIP, it reminds me of those little sippy cups, you know, childcare sippy cups. And you know, They do sippy cups in childcare?

They still do appropriate practice, right?

I miss those. Yes, I want my little sippy cup.

Yeah. And you might find a provider that probably says I was a sippy, meaning they went through the Childcare Initiative Project to be able to receive their license through that process.

Fantastic. Thank you so much, CDE.

Good afternoon, Mister chair and Members of the Committee, Sarah Nevill Morgan, deputy Superintendent from the California Department of Education, representing State Superintendent Tony Thurmond. I want to start off by expressing our appreciation for this panel's focus on quality because as we established in the early stages of the universal pre K mixed delivery quality and access workgroup quality, access and equity are intertwined.

CDE's quality work is grounded in the research that has identified the elements of high quality pre K programs that matter most for children, like early learning standards and curricula that address the whole child and are developmentally informed with a deep scope and sequence related to language, literacy, and mathematics child assessments that are used to inform instruction program assessments that measure structure and process quality, such as responsive interactions, addressing belonging and anti bias, and a well prepared, supported, and compensated workforce.

Going back to the panel before this around rates, CDE's approach to quality is child centered and deeply focused on adult child interactions with a grounding in diversity, equity, inclusion, and belonging. The efforts to support quality in California's early learning and care system are administered through several channels, each with different Administration, funding levels, and approaches. The big one is quality counts California, a collaboration between the California Department of ED, First Five California and the Department of Social Services.

Our Quality counts California funding is administered through a network of locally implemented quality rating and improvement systems, or quality improvement systems, which use a quality matrix to measure quality at the site level, create data informed improvement plans, and provide technical assistance, training, and coaching addressing areas that are shown to need additional support. We also have additional quality support and improvement grants, mainly administered by the California Department of Social Services, that Doctor Lupe Jaime just referred to, but also some at the California Department of ED.

I'm going to dive a little bit more deeply into parts of quality counts California this California State Preschool program CSPP Curious Block grant, which is a major component of this we receive 50 million in annual Proposition 98 education funding to support this work, and it goes to local County Office of Education grantees who then support the data collection quality improvement activities like professional development, use of high quality instructional materials, responsive interactions and instructional strategies via the classroom assessment, scoring system or class, and use of assessments and developmental screenings such as ages and stages questionnaire.

In 2022-23, 86% of our state preschool program sites participated in the block grant, and we hope to continue to see this number increase.

Of those sites, 71% were rated at the top two highest quality tiers, and we know from a 2021 Learning Policy Institute, University of Berkeley and West Ed study that children in programs rated higher on California's quality matrix had greater developmental gains and that the gains were greatest for multilingual learners than for non multilingual learners and greater for children with disabilities than typically developing children and that children of all racial ethnic groups experience greater learning and development in programs that were rated higher on the quality matrix.

Informed by the recommendations from the UPK mixed delivery quality and Access Workgroup process report, CDE is taking some steps to move our CSPP QRS block grant into a quality recognition and support system for state preschool that will align us more with the TK to 12 multi tiered system of support and pair our CDE monitoring system with the quality components at the local level to really help our state preschool programs be successful in implementing their program standards at a highly effective level.

This includes their requirement to serve children with disabilities to support multilingual learners to create belonging while addressing a reduction in biased suspension and exclusionary practices, their use of the preschool transitional kindergarten learning foundations and the desired results developmental profile and implementing aligned curriculum along with implementing the class and responsive interactions, this redesign system will create be able to create intentional connections to transitional kindergarten Head Start, our before and after expanded learning school programs and the mixed delivery partners as we move forward with some more input sessions with our grantees.

Unfortunately, the 50 million annual CSPP QRS blockground funding was calculated based on 2014 to 15 enrollment and has not increased since then, nor has it accounted for inflation, which, as we know, has been pretty significant in the past 10 years. It also does not support transitional kindergarten, which creates a gap in a coherence across a universal pre k system.

As CDE supports a system of high quality pre k learning experiences for all children, we are really focused on how to best support an educator first system of improving adult child interactions and enhancing equity through increased school readiness for all children. To support this, the CDE is implementing the class or the classroom assessment support system and class environment in our state preschool programs.

To support this implementation, we've invested in a regional and statewide support system through a new component called aspire or achieving success in positive interactions, relationships and environments. Before I conclude, I want to just touch on. We have a few more grants that really come into play and what we have done is create a thread throughout all of them to make sure that class is included in all of them, as well as a deep focus on children with disabilities and multilingual learners.

So we have our UPK planning and implementation grants, an early Ed teacher development grant, our inclusive early education expansion program, as well as work on our preschool transitional kindergarten learning foundations and the Child Assessment Observation tool, the DRDP. And that concludes my remarks.

Thank you. Good afternoon. My name is Anna Powell. I'm a senior research and policy associate from the Center for the Study of Child Care Employment at UC Berkeley. Our research focuses on California's teachers of children from birth through age five. So some background you've already heard. I'll reiterate briefly on the ECE workforce. It is predominantly women of color, 71% of our family child care providers, and 64% of center teachers, teachers and assistants.

Additionally, around one third speak Spanish, and our workforce closely represents the children in their care. Unlike the education of school aged children, California does not have a cohesive system of childcare investments. As a consequence, much of ECE is privately funded through tuition paid by parents, and this sets up a broken market which negatively impacts parents, children, and the ECE workforce. Based on the current price of childcare and median income, a single parent would spend 48% of her income to enroll an infant in a childcare center.

Meanwhile, the prices parents pay translate to meager wages for the childcare workforce as the dollars are spread thinly across numerous staff positions. The resulting market failure cannot and will not result in affordable and accessible child care for all without government intervention. But so how does California support this ECE workforce? As you've heard, California does invest in its childcare programs and thus in the providers who work there.

However, the rates which California currently pays are pegged to the market rate and therefore exacerbate and reinforce low wages and turnover. Additionally, the recent dollars that are flowing to UPK universal pre kindergarten are primarily bringing new dollars into schools. This is the first truly universal offering in ECE. However, it doesn't yield a cohesive system supporting all settings of ECE. Moreover, the rapid shift of four-year-olds is destabilizing traditional ECE settings. According to our research, the average childcare center enrolled 80 children pre-pandemic.

This number fell to 48 children at the height of shelter in place in 2020 and only partially recovered to 55 enrollments as of 2023. So programs that were hollowed out by the pandemic have been unable to recover their enrollment or staffing levels. At the same time as four year olds shift into TK, their experienced preschool teachers do not have a direct way of following them without going back to school and adding to their student loan debt. Instead, school districts are retraining teachers of older children.

So what is needed is a pathway for experienced membership of the existing ECE workforce to gain access to either the new p three specialist credential or another pathway to become lead teachers in TK. Fundamentally, I'm going to jump ahead because I don't want to take too much time. So our research shows that the slow wages has a profound impact on the ECE workforce.

The median wage of a full time childcare center teacher is about 39,500, and economic insecurity is common with with the most severe effects for black, Latino, and immigrant educators. About half of center based teachers also hold a bachelor's degree or higher, but having that degree only nets them a few dollars more per hour relative to an educator with an associate's degree, so there is not the return on their education that you would expect from another field. As a consequence, food security insecurity is relatively high.

About a third of the childcare workforce experiences it, and along those lines of disparities, that's 39% of center teachers who are women of color and 42% who are immigrants. Economic well being is also tied to mental and physical well being of the workforce. This is both rewarding and demanding work, and the poor wages undermine the workforce's ability to respond to job stress or injury. So what would a strong set of policy supports look like?

We at the center have a five pillar set of strategies that we would put forward. You've already heard about compensation and public funding, so I won't spend too much time on that just to reiterate that public investments will be necessary both in the rate reform conversation and beyond. But additionally, we would also talk about the professional pathways, which includes both institutes of higher ed as well as local agencies that are providing ongoing training and support.

Robust investments in this policy area would include supporting local bright spots and pilots, which are abundant around the state, a lot of innovation taking place which could inform broader statewide support, for example, for apprenticeships helping folks to join the workforce. Additionally, a professional pathway must include a ready access to the pk three specialist credential or equivalent for experienced preschool teachers without having to go back in school and incur further student debt. Additionally, professional supports are related to the work environments.

California, as you've heard, invests in quality counts, which is a framework for program quality, but it does not necessarily touch on staff well being and working conditions. So California must once again listen to its champions at the local level about what is needed to address these additional dimensions of quality. Finally, data is our fifth dimension. You've heard about the different types of data that are gathered, but unfortunately we do not in our state have a cohesive way of gathering workforce data across all these ECE settings.

This, in fact puts us behind many other states which, for example, have implemented fully the workforce registry, where all Members of preschool teachers childcare providers are included in that database. This is essential for effective governance. So additionally, I would mention that California has not been able to provide funding for monitoring the rollout of UPK. There's a lot happening and changing very quickly, and we could certainly benefit from more support apart from the occasional philanthropic donation to help us get a glimpse of what's going on.

In conclusion, supporting the ECE workforce requires addressing public funding and compensation. But there are additional actions that California should take, empowering counties with funding for professional pathways and supportive work environments and funding investments in the workforce, registry and UPK implementation. Thank you.

Good afternoon. My name is Christina Alvarado. I'm the Executive Director at the Child Care alliance of Los Angeles. Today I'll be speaking on the ECE workhorse registry as well as SIP, the sippers. The registry is run by the alliance and SIP is monitored through the California Resource and referral network and is available in every county through all of the resource and referral agencies. So to begin with the registry, child care providers create a profile that generates an e-portfolio.

These can track and access trainings, upload documents such as transcripts, and then on the back end, we verify those transcripts with the corresponding college that they submit and this is stored for them for future use. I don't have to keep going back and getting those. At present, we have over 163,000 individuals across California with a registry profile.

They also have online access to mobile friendly training calendars where they can sign up for workshops in every community, in every county across the state in a number of languages. Right now, if you look at our system, we have 2500 workshops posted there today. Also, the providers can access a resume builder and job board. So all of this information is available to them at the click of a button.

In addition, though their administrators or supervisors or, you know, childcare business owners have access to their information, so they have access to their own as well as their staff. When it's time to do licensing, they can get all that information from the registry without having to submit paper over and over again to the, to the state. And all of it is in real time. In terms of the counties themselves, we have data sharing agreements with 55 counties.

This helps them collect data that they need to submit to the state for their reports. It also allows participants from many of the programs that have been mentioned before with the ECE workforce support, such as quality counts, California workforce pathways, first five California impact, and a lot of others for them to sign up and track their progress through the registry. Last September, we launched the Stipend module, which was originally created in San Francisco in 2013.

Counties use this module so that individuals can enroll directly into their programs and they can use that again to meet their reporting requirements to the state. Finally, state agencies rely on the data from the registry to help them complete federal reporting requirements. Excuse me, so that saves the state time effort and it saves everybody a little bit of extra work, I guess. Today, the registry is funded through first five California until 2025. Then we face a cliff effect.

As noted in today's agenda, we are eager to look for long term solutions and partner with all of you to maintain this important tool available to the workforce, the counties and the state agencies. I would like to reference recommendations in the Assembly Blue Ribbon Commission from April 2019, which they recommended to extend the California Early Care and Education workforce registry to all counties and support the ECE workforce.

They also recommended to invest in and maintain comprehensive workforce data system and the California Early Care and Education workforce registry to identify the characteristics and needs of the workforce and to assess the reach of policy initiatives and investments. So a quick word on SIP, which is, I know you like that word, and we do, too. So we call them sippers. And SIP is a program that has been funded through the state, I would say for at least 30 years, if not more.

It is to help new business owners start a family childcare home. There's an emphasis on infant and toddler care. Sippers attend trainings and they also learn about how to run a business. They're counseled on how to get ready for the visit from title 22 or title, you know, for their license. And we do track the sippers in the registry as well. So over the past eight years, we've had over 16,000 sippers who have participated in over 100,000 workshops throughout the state. Thank you for your time.

Good afternoon. My name is Maeva Marc and I am the VP of advocacy and policy with Kidango and we are a childcare provider in the Bay Area serving over 5000 families. I want to take this time to honor Delaine Easton because she was a fierce advocate and helped us open our Delaine Easton Center in Fremont, California.

I'm also a former preschool teacher and special education teacher and a proud co founder of Black Californians United for Early Care and Education and a Member of the ECE Budget Coalition. I'm here today to talk about the importance of quality in our early care and education system. We can all agree that the first five years of a child's life are the most important for their brain development.

That's why when we consider investments and policy solutions, they must be rooted in whole child, whole family and whole community approaches. To quote an African proverb, it takes a village to raise a child. Here in California, we have the opportunity to build an equitable mixed delivery ECE system that centers the child and works for families and the ECE workforce. No one comes into this field to get rich. No parent seeks out childcare because they want to. Families seek out childcare because they have a need.

A need for gainful employment and access to affordable, conveniently located, quality care for their child. A need for their child to be ready to succeed in school and in life. So what does that look like? First, let's focus on the child. Each and every child needs culturally rich, developmentally and linguistically relevant, responsive and affirming care and education in a safe and nurturing, trauma informed, inclusive learning environment that is committed to them, meeting their milestones and building their academic skills.

Second, respecting parents choice acknowledging that parents are children's first teachers and they know their child's needs best. Therefore, families must have and know about the variety of options and settings that meet their needs and circumstances, whether it be friend family, neighbor care, a family childcare home, a center based or school based, or a combination of any of those. Third, the ECE workforce.

It's one of the most diverse workforce where the majority of practitioners are women of color with life experience, an experience from their home country and educational experience. It is also a workforce that is highly underpaid.

Therefore, as our system changes and new evidence based, anti racist research arise, it is essential to make sure that the field has access to free and affordable professional development to enhance their programs and curricula, whether it be through professional learning networks, mentorship programs, coaching, peer to peer training, and educational attainment that is accessible to practitioners.

Training opportunities need to be tailored contextually for all levels of experience, whether it be a first time caregiver entering the field to a master teacher who wants to add to their tool belt. Now let's talk about money. Investing in every program type that serve children and families, regardless of state standards, can lead to quality improvement. Childcare and preschool programs are the modern day village.

They provide informal home visiting, early intervention and inclusion services, nutrition, vision and dental screenings, early childhood mental health consultation, family engagement, parent leadership skills, advocacy trainings, and so much more. If properly invested, our ECE system can become liberating for children, families and the ECE workforce. We cannot do this without sustaining our current rates and adopting an alternative rate methodology based on the actual cost of care, as mentioned in the previous panel by Donna Sneeringer. So I really appreciate your time, and thank you for listening.

Thank you all very much for your testimony. You all are converting me into a sipper, I'll tell you that. A few questions I have first is particularly LAO. You mentioned about the CCDBG quality plan being outside of the budget process, although there's financial implications to within that plan. Correct.

As a part of the budget process, the department's budget backup does include a line item for quality improvement activities that reflects the minimum amount required by the Federal Government. What it doesn't include is a program by program breakout of how those dollars will be used and allocated for each activity. Traditionally, that has always happened after the fact.

A Legislature approves the total amount, but then the allocation on a program by program basis is done administratively and we're just, our recommendation is, as a part of the May revision, include a program by program breakout. So then the Legislature has insight, but then also opportunities to provide input on those specific program by program items.

Which Department is responsible for this plan?

Now that it's moved over? It's Department of Social Services.

Department of Social Services. Got it. Department of Social Services is obviously this LAO recommendation whenever they recommend that the Legislature be involved in the process. Of course, we always love that. Is that something you're amenable to in terms of discussing as we approach this May Revise?

Yes. So Doctor Lupe Milehan, Milam and yes, we're open to conversations.

Looking forward to those conversations. Obviously, this is a year of some hard decisions, but I look forward to the time where our budget is in a better place. And once that happens around this time, at that point, hopefully next year, hopefully this year, maybe not, I will be given a number, a dollar amount to say this is some new spending opportunities. Where do you want to prioritize this funding? Where should I prioritize that funding?

So the process that we have in regards to the priority of the funding is through the state plan. CCDF has certain requirements in regards to linking through quality. It calls out specific factors that we make sure that we have multi year contracts to reflect and are meeting the needs. The other piece with the state plan is that we hear directly from the workforce.

We want to make sure that we, that what we're currently producing in regards to our priorities, both the Legislator and the Administration are jointly addressing that need of our workforce itself. And that plan is a multi year plan. However, understanding that we are always collecting feedback throughout the year or two to make sure that the information and what we are able to roll out is meeting the needs of our workforce.

I want to hear from other panelists, too. Where should I prioritize this funding or I can use it for something else?

If I. Can jump in because the workforce is so strained and as we heard earlier, they can barely make ends meet. Anything that we can support the providers in terms of their daily workload, what they're working on. I know that during COVID they were there 100% for the workforce. They took care of the essential workers. They were on the line. Many of them lost their lives through the process.

So I think given the fact that they're getting very Low pay, we could at least maybe make sure that they have the tools necessary to work in their family, childcare homes in their centers on a day to day basis. That doesn't answer which one are we going to look at first? Because I think that's perhaps a bigger conversation, but anything that can help alleviate all of the stress that they're under would be, I think, really welcome.

I would also say, you know, putting the child first. If we want children to be well, we need to make sure that the adults that are taking care of them are well. And so when we have a workforce who is open all day, from morning to night, taking care of other people's kids and on their feet all day, and they have to go home and still scramble, it's that will show up when they're with the children.

And so I believe it is very necessary to ensure that when we invest, we're investing in the workforce, not just in their training, but also in them and paying them what they're worth. At Kidango, we've been able to. We've been able to provide all of our classroom staff a livable wage, but it's still not enough, especially in the Bay Area. We need a professional wage for this workforce.

And when you talk about that livable wage, what is that?

So, based on the past investments that we've had within the last 10 years, we've been able to braid our contracts. And looking at the livable wage metric from MIT, we were able to make sure that every single person at our. Every staff Member is making at least $26 an hour. Our most. So our substitute teachers, our teacher aides, those are the most entry level positions that we have. They start at $26 per hour.

Okay.

Anna Powell, Center for the Study of Child Care Employment. To add to my comment, the living wage for a worker with a child is more like $42 an hour in California. So that would be perhaps more of a long term goal for us to move to. But just pointing out that the incredible success that Contango has had would still, as she mentioned, be challenging for educators who are also parents to afford living, I would urge the Legislature to focus on funding the floor.

We are not at the floor of the funding needed to support a cohesive and supported ECE system or its workforce, and staying, having that as the North Star, I think would be an excellent priority for the coming years remaining in Governor Newsom's tenure.

Department of Education many of the innovative programs you've been able to stand up is due to the federal funds, ARPA funds and other things. And of course, as you know, going to be ending. What are some of the most effective programs you've been able to see that you hope would be able to continue even after those federal funds expire? Are there any shining stars in this? Does it give us a great opportunity to innovate, to do pilots, to experiment? What are some of those ones that kind of stand out?

Sarah Neville Morgan from the Department of Education that is a great question. And if you're looking at all of education goes into many, many areas. So if you want me to focus specifically on universal pre k, which is in my scope, I think some of the funding that we've done with the inclusive early ed expansion program, we've been able to see some really innovative practices at the local level to support coaching and inclusion and address that.

So we were very grateful for the Legislature, including additional funds last year and the budget to really continue that and hope that that actually becomes more permanent moving forward because those funds are so critical and support not just the LEA or local education agency based state preschools, but also our community based more and more moving forward. I think the gaps that we see in innovation could tie back into the tk to 12. What we don't have are funds to support dual language immersion programs.

And the more that you can start dual language supports in preschool or even earlier in the infant toddler side, the more we know that we're actually helping with brain development as well as that affirmation of culture, language and belonging.

So those critical pieces we've also, in our early educator teacher development grant, seen amazing things happening at the local level where cohorts are coming together to support not just state preschool, but also TK and kindergarten teachers in achieving more child development units to really help with that firm understanding of what a child needs and then helping teachers go through without incurring the costs to get their pk three credential.

If that was on their pathway, and if not, if they wanted to get a child development program pathways to help support them there, I think we would all say no one should go into debt to work with our children. We don't pay them enough to go into debt. Our community colleges have a wonderful system that truly can be free in so many ways.

But still there are sometimes there are costs incurred around books and materials and there still needs to be more cohort and other linked classes to support people to be successful as they go through a higher ed pathway. We'll always come back to compensation and rates, but I think that's different. It's beyond the quality dollar scope and what we get. The other things that we would say that need to happen really focus on our preschool TK learning foundations. When those come out, those are very innovative.

We have embedded children's language in a way that we've never seen in any other state and actually think not only will these be grabbed across the country, but internationally with the interest that we've seen in what's happening, but without professional development, without coaching, we know that coaching works. Going to a one shot training workshop does not leave anybody with a change in practice.

So making sure that whatever systems we're putting together also include quality, effective coaching, and then I'd lift up some of the class pieces we're doing. So as we we listen to Dallas and we don't listen to Texas for everything, but when they're really diving in to address equity, watch it reduce suspension. Well, we are California, so we're always going to be California first with whatever state.

But really looking at the inequities that happen in practice and the bias that we can bring into a program, helping them reflect, be more responsive and understand instructional strategies. But that takes coaching that can't just be done through a one time training.

My last question for this panel is, are there program improvements to the SIP needed for effectiveness at scale? Anyone have any thoughts on that? Because it seems to me this program is one meant to help solve our childcare desert issues. The pandemic caused us to actually go backwards in terms of our capacity, not forwards, and we still have not recovered from that. Unless I'm wrong, you're right.

So what do we need to do to, number one, are there things we can do to even make the program more effective? And should this be one of the programs that we prioritize the most in terms of future dollar opportunities?

So I'll go ahead and start again. Doctor Lupe Jaime-Mileham at CDSS and as far as the Child Care Initiative Project, it is highly responsible for, like you've mentioned, starting new businesses, specifically in childcare deserts across the state, and more importantly, really meeting the needs of the infants and toddlers that are, that families don't have a lot of options for in terms of care choices across the state.

With that, we recently, I believe it was the last budget to increase those dollars to ensure that that sustainability of that project continues. In the past pandemic period, they had received some increases due to those stabilization dollars and we knew that there was a cliff approaching.

And therefore it was very important to make sure that although we couldn't match it with the same amount of dollars that we had with the pandemic's temporary funds, we wanted to make sure that those providers that were potential providers that were going through the pipeline were continuing to be supported. Throughout that as far as efficiency of scale, I would also reference that they do get supports from the resource and referral network in San Francisco.

They are part of that system of support where they meet regionally with the SIPPIs contractors across the state and not only share practices in regards to how to continue to learn from each other and efficiencies, but also the bright spots, understanding that sometimes one approach does not fit all and somebody across the state could be, which we see many times doing some innovative work that the other resource and referrals can continue to build upon or learn from.

Since this program has been inception for so many years, as referenced, there has been a lot of learning, a lot of supports, and continuing to just receive feedback on how we can make sure that we're supportive of that system. Thank you.

If I could add on so beyond SIP, which actually I was a trainer of over 20 years in the program, you do so many connections, but there are also things around shared services, models that really support providers as they onboard. A lot of our providers, our teachers come into this because they love children, they love the programs part. The business side is not so much a love and a deep understanding.

And so having an aspect in communities, especially in communities that we may be looking at deserts, that shared service can pick up a lot of the business components and really create efficiencies and lower cost models. Models.

I would reiterate the need for shared service networks. It's a strong solution that is being implemented in a number of places around the country and is supportive not only to providers who are just getting established in their licensed home based program, but also those who are trying to maintain one.

Additionally, I would mention in terms of providers going through the child care initiative project or becoming licensed, there's often a challenge for folks who are renters to complete the process of becoming licensed, even though California law protects renters from landlord, for example, not wanting them or trying to retaliate for them having a program in their home. This is a place where housing policy can intersect with ECE policy and that it can be challenging as a renter to persevere through the challenges of starting up a program.

So we see about three quarters of family child care providers are homeowners, which likely does not reflect the overall population of California. And there may be other folks who would like to go through the program but are intimidated by that prospect.

Oh, you're starting something. Okay. I want to appreciate this panel so much. I want to, obviously more to come. I think at some point I might be at Berkeley, would like to spend some more time with the center over there as well. But want to thank this panel. We have some housekeeping issues. Want to let everyone know we're going to do a 10 minute recess, and when we reconvene, it will be in room 444. Room 444. Ooh, all these grumblings. Dang.

Go to the elevator, room 444. And we will reconvene at 130. Public comment on this info hearing will also be in room 444, as well as the subsequent budget hearing as well. We just have to make room for another Committee to take over this room. And so we will see you there. We will recess for about 1010 minutes.

Can we get Members of issue five to come up here? We just want to see if everyone's here or not. Come on up and make your way up here. Doesn't mean we're getting started. Just want to make sure where we see everyone. Yeah, 12345.

We are going to reconvene here in our wonderful new location, room 444. In case you're wondering, where are we? We are going to move on to issue number five. Breaking barriers to childcare access. A year of budget challenges is a great opportunity to work better and identify barriers to success in our existing investments. This panel will cover recommendations intended to address childcare deserts and support childcare capacity and access expansion statewide.

I particularly want to highlight during the time of the pandemic, I remember when we were discussing issues of childcare, and at the time I was on the Riverside County Board of Education, and one of the most devastating things that we heard was our local first five. First five. Riverside had funds to help childcare centers to be able to expand its capacity. As others were closing down, others had opportunities to expand.

And one of the worst news we got was a child care center had to give back the money because in order to expand, they would have to, you know, do a whole lot of things to meet the fire marshals requirements, which then became cost prohibitive.

And that, that always stands out to me, which is why I know, for me, it's one of my biggest priorities to continue to find barriers and even try to find more cost effective alternatives to what we are, our centers are being required to do so that we make it easier to expand, easier to establish new centers, easier to recognize that childcare providers are an essential benefit to our community, that we need to continue to make it easier, not harder for that to happen.

We are going to start off with the LAO to begin and then also just, I want to make sure that if you're a Member, if you've been a Member of a previous panel, we might have Members come back to ask questions from previous panels. So some of you may be drafted back to up here to answer those specific questions, but just know, trying to make sure that we accommodate everyone.

And if you're wondering why is everyone running through these halls and, you know, going from one room to another? Well, this is the infamous Bill deadline week, in which people are trying to get their bills out and votes and all that kind of stuff. So things are a little chaotic. But welcome to Sacramento, LAO.

You may begin Jackie Barocio Legislative Analyst Office my comments will be specific to just providing additional context for the childcare infrastructure dollars as noted in your agenda, across a couple of years, the state in total has provided $350 million to support both minor repairs, but then also new construction of child care buildings.

And across these two programs, just based off of information provided by the Department, a total of 7000 applications were received that then totaled an ask of $1.0 billion, which, as I mentioned, we only provided 350 million. So clearly the ask exceeded the amount of available funding. Our understanding is that the Department has exhausted all funds for minor repair projects and is now still in the process of allocating new construction funds.

One thing that I will flag is that a portion of these infrastructure funds are being funded with temporary COVID-19 money that expire this September. So the Legislature may want to ask whether these funds have been liquidated by the federal deadline and if not, could those dollars be replaced with the General Fund dollar just to allow projects to continue beyond the expiration date?

But then also the Legislature could ask about what happens if funds allocated to certain projects are not completed by the expenditure date or an appropriation deadline. And to the extent, if awardees need more time, what would need to occur to make that happen? Thank you.

Perfect. So, good afternoon again, Doctor Lupe Jaime-Mileham Deputy Director of the child care and development division at CDSS, and again very excited about speaking to breaking barriers to childcare access piece. So in the recent years, investments in the subsidies, childcare and development systems have increased dramatically. Overall funding funding 4.3 billion and 21-22 to 5.9 billion to 23-24. The Governor's Budget includes 6.7 billion total in funding for childcare programs in 24-25.

And as we referenced earlier, this is an enormous growth of 1.7 billion in funding over 10 years ago. So, for example, according to September of 2021 caseload report, 56,334 children were enrolled in the CAP program before the slot expansion. Based on plenary December 2023 caseload report 134,274 children are currently enrolled in that alternate payment program, which is about 138% increase. So just have to smile all around as that's a huge victory for all of us.

Several investments were made in the infrastructure to meet the existing needs, including the overall expansion of subsidies and expanded slots. An example is, as referenced, the infrastructure grant, which includes minor renovation and repair and new construction and major construction pieces. I'm going to touch briefly on what was referenced in regards to that. Yes, so the minor renovation and repair is funded through federal stabilization dollars. That sunset 9302024. However, the current contract that we have with providers in order for those awardees is 6302024.

But we have a option of being, being able to do offer an amendment that will take us to the final liquidation date of 9302024 as those requests are being processed and those are coming in now. So that is our contingency plan to make sure that we maximize every dollar that is sent there. It was 350.5 million total between the two grants.

We were very competitive, both of them and approximately 3772 grantees were awarded the grant to add up the 5144 RFA applications for the minor and one applicant and I wanted to share just a quick quote of one of the applicants that was awarded this that said, we often feel like no one truly values the work we do. This funding gave me hope.

It was the first time that we were able to apply for something so big and when I got the letter, it was a dream come true. I had cried because it was something so good that was happening. That quote is powerful when you look at these grants. Historically, we had not included family child care home providers in a previous type of, of investments that were more of a loan type too.

And so that was very unique to be able to build an opportunity to make sure that the groups are able to apply for these dollars. Another investment made to the infrastructure that meets the needs of families is also through seeking technology to assist with childcare needs through the online referrals, which is the mychildcareplan.org website. We learned a lot during the pandemic, especially knowing that families are now seeking more options in addition to talking to a light person.

But also our phones become a way of being able to seek care and including word of mouth also. So in partnership with the resource and referrals across the state, the statewide platform assists families in assessing child care referrals online in real time.

Providers can go in there in real time and update their information, and families can search at hours that is convenient for them to be able to look for the type of care and their options based on the information that they input in that platform piece. In October of 2023, the myChildcareplan.org surpassed over 1 million site visits by families seeking care. And so I'm sure that if we look at that data now, I'm sure that number has grown tremendously.

Another example is the Childcare SIP initiative project, which we've touched on already, which invests in regards to targeting and recruiting and retaining new childcare sites. The one piece I think I would add in addition to the previous panel is the acknowledgement that not only are they recruiting new businesses, but they're also supporting the businesses to stay in business and that the retention piece is just as powerful as the recruitment of those, of those providers.

Obviously, it's difficult to stay in the field and so being able to have that trusted messenger that they can continue to support and navigate while they're in business is highly important of that. For that investment too. Another Fund stat for that is fiscal year 22-23. SIP assisted with 520,570, I'm sorry, 520,571 licensees with technical assistance. So that's both new and ongoing. And that also includes center base in that too.

And 1114 providers acquired a new license as 803 expanded their current so they went like from a small to a large. So you can have an idea that these make impacts across the state. We know that the capacity building is still a work in progress. We have a lot more to do and appreciate the partnership and the community of, in the community that we're continuing to work together with the Legislator to expand on these efforts. I'm happy to answer any questions at the appropriate time. Thank you.

Thanks chair Alvarez and chair Jackson. Thank you for the opportunity to share LIF's thoughts on breaking barriers to access to child care. My name is Doctor Shelly Masur and I serve as the Vice President of advisory and state policy at the Low Income Investment Fund, or LIF. LIF is a national community development financial institution with our home in California. We have offices in San Francisco and LA, and we are dedicated to ensuring that everyone lives in a community of equity, opportunity and well being.

LIF also has a commitment to racial equity and centering the voices of the community in all of our work in California, LIF has been honored to partner with CDSS to administer the Child Care Infrastructure Grant program and has administered San Francisco's Child Care Facilities Fund for over 25 years. As a result, we've been fortunate to work with thousands of providers, hear their voices, and help meet their needs.

It is through this lens and as a Member of the ECE coalition, that Lyft firmly believes that to break barriers to access, we must invest in both the people infrastructure, the workforce that we've discussed already and the physical infrastructure, the facilities, and the surrounding community. As we have all heard, we do need more investments in the workforce and better addressing the needs of all the people who dedicate their lives to caring for our children.

I will just note LiF does support the ECE Coalition's request this year and will continue to be a strong voice for that. The Legislature's 2021 unprecedented commitment to investing in ensuring safe, healthy, quality child care facilities in California through the California Infrastructure Grant program is part of addressing a need for new spaces and has made a significant difference in the lives of children, families and the child care educators who serve them.

We know that both regular maintenance and upgrades cost money and that these needs have been exacerbated by the impacts of climate change, which is why we saw over 80% of providers ask for money for climate related investments in their facilities. We also know that despite the state's significant investment, thousands of child care providers did not receive an infrastructure grant and the need remains high.

As you heard from the Lao and from Doctor Jaime-Mileham, to continue the work that's been set in motion and to expand the supply of childcare across the state, LIF recommends the following. We recommend that the Legislature extend the infrastructure grant program beyond its current expiration. Earlier you asked about innovative and good uses, Doctor Jackson of ARPA dollars and I would argue that the infrastructure grant program is one of those excellent uses.

All the current monies, as you heard, have been allocated, but the interest remains high, and providers both need the monies to address needed and quality upgrades and are willing to consider expanding if they have the capital to do so. That's why LIF, in partnership with Assemblymember Calderon, even in this very challenging budget year, has a request to consider adding $50 million to the program this year. We estimate that to truly meet ongoing needs would require an investment of approximately $150 million per year.

However, we also estimate the current shortfall of eligible but unfunded projects to be about 50 million within the IGP. We recommend that the state ensures it makes payments in a timely fashion that makes policy changes that allow technical assistance for providers during the application process, as well as technical assistance to community organizations who have personal connections to the providers in that child care community. We also recommend that the state make these grant funds exempt from taxes.

We recommend that in the state's CCDF plan, they take advantage of revised federal guidelines regarding the use of funds for facilities repair and renovation and allocate some dollars to repair and renovation of both family child care and center based care. The Legislature should also consider taking action to lower provider costs and incentivize employers to contribute to child care through tax credits.

Multiple diverse states, including Oregon, Colorado, Texas, Oklahoma, Alabama, have created employer and child care provider tax credits, including exempting child care facilities from property tax and providing tax credit for employers who contribute to child care costs. We recommend that the state leverage other available dollars for infrastructure like the significant investments anticipated through the Greenhouse Gas Reduction Fund, including the solar for all program. We recommend leveraging funding dedicated to small business development and support and leveraging dollars allocated for affordable housing.

For example, the Oregon Legislature allocated $10 million to support coal location of affordable housing and childcare in communities across the state to address the dual need for housing and childcare and to build strong communities. In California, local communities are already working to advance colocation and the state has an opportunity to provide a match or grant support. For example, in San Diego, childcare advocates have worked with developers, the city and the county to encourage and support colocation.

And in Riverside County, lift to a Coachella Valley housing organization has an ambitious goal of 40% of its new affordable housing, including child care. Further, funds like the first time home buyers program can support family child care providers who wish to own their own home.

To make all state grant dollars easier to access for child care providers, LIF has proposed AB 2732 authored by Assemblymember Papin, that would add childcare to the search on grants.ca.gov.one additional item for consideration includes making technical changes to the CAL FIRE Urban Green Schoolyards program to make those dollars easier for child care providers to access so they can build outdoor spaces that respond to climate change and connect children to nature.

LIF appreciates the opportunity to share its thoughts and recommendations with you all and looks forward to working with you to make them a reality.

Good afternoon. Thank you Chair Jackson, Chair Alvarez, and Members of the Committee for the Opportunity to discuss the issue of early care and education and the importance of breaking barriers to increase access and expansion my name is Jaqueline Wyse. I'm the coordinator of Early Childhood Education for the Folsom Cordova School District. I serve as a board Member of Every Child California which I am representing here today. My agency or school district is located in Sacramento county.

There are nine sites and we serve over 400 preschool children per day, in addition to 72 special ed preschool students who are located at at the school site where I'm currently working. I've been in the field of education. For, believe it or not, over 40 years.

And the last 10 of those years have been in the field of early childhood education, and it seems that every year the early childhood community has had to advocate for sufficient funding. I see many talented individuals leave the ECE field to move on to other positions or leave the field of education entirely due to insufficient pay. Staffing for our program continues to be. A challenge for us, especially finding qualified associate teachers and instructional assistants, including substitutes.

I also serve in a district where we are continually looking for bilingual candidates who are reflective of the population we serve because in our district we speak 25 to 30 different languages and we'd like for our ECE field program professionals. To be reflective of the students who we serve. It's also important to note that associate teachers are required to have at least.

12 units of early childhood development, or ECE or child development, and instructional assistants are required to have at least six units in ECE or CD. All of our great substitutes have been hired to replace others who have left the field. So it is a continuous cycle of advertising, interviewing, and hiring qualified candidates.

And what happens if I don't hire a qualified sub and we're short staffed for that day because we are still. Having people who are out. Unfortunately, some with COVID I roll up my sleeves and I have to go in the classroom and work with the students, therefore pushing back all the administrative responsibilities. And as I and every child and every child California offer up some recommendations this afternoon, I want to echo that none of these proposals can be accomplished in a vacuum.

Rates and workforce development are crucial elements in our system, our system of change and I want to acknowledge that you cannot break barriers and create excess without first addressing the compensation reimbursement piece. However, since I know this has been covered on previous panels, I will align my comments with them.

Additionally, there are numerous hurdles and regulations to running early care and education programs in California, and I will outline a number of no or Low cost recommendations that will have immediate positive effects for our child care programs. I'd like to start with community care licensing. As you mentioned earlier, all center based programs in California must be licensed through community care licensing and any license changes need to be approved before a center can serve children.

This includes changing an existing license to serve more children, serving younger children, or establishing a new license in a new facility, and this process can sometimes take months.

There are massive delays in programs not being able to spend expansion funds as they are waiting for their license to be approved. As subsidized programs move towards serving more children, new licenses will need to be expedited. We recommend prioritizing and expediting licenses for subsidized child care centers for both expansion of subsidized spaces and changes in age. If not, the money goes unspent and children and families go unserved.

Second thing I'd like to talk a little bit about is facility and infrastructure, and you touched on it earlier. Chair Jackson Community care licensing requires all children to have at least 35ft of indoor space and 75ft of outdoor space regardless of age, even if they are infants and not mobile. Such a large outdoor square footage requirement limits the license capacity of many infant centers.

A center may be licensed for 65 children, but would only be able to serve 35 based on the outdoor space requirements, even though they meet the indoor space requirements for the children. So we recommend that consideration be given to a waiver that could be created for outdoor space. Square footage requirements for infant licenses if there is sufficient indoor square footage for the child, this would immediately and dramatically help center based programs serve more infants, especially in childcare deserts and dense urban areas.

The other thing I'd like to talk about is policy changes to strengthen the existing infrastructure. Title V direct contracting centers have additional requirements that we need to fulfill our contracts. This includes child assessments. We talked about those earlier drdps, observation, parent engagement, ectors, which is being phased out, which will now become class, but it's a review of the environment, program reviews and more. Child care agencies are allotted only two professional development days per year.

However, only 18% of direct contractors utilize these professional development days based on numbers by CDE. This is because these professional development days are not considered days of operation. Even if the agency serves children for half of the day and then closes for the other half, this is still not considered a full day of operation. As such, in order to train our staff, programs need to pay overtime and infringe upon their already overworked teachers personal life.

We recommend that professional development days should be considered days of operation. It is critical that child care workers are compensated for their training hours and agencies should not have to decide between enrolling fewer children and training staff. Professional development day expenses should also cover food, beverages, and training materials. These expenses are currently not allowable and must be paid for out of other agency funds. Staff requirements as noted earlier, there is a workforce shortage.

We all know that staff requirements for Title V programs are even more rigorous. Requiring a child development permit in addition to the ECE hours, finding qualified staff is a huge challenge, especially for infant toddler children and children with special needs. We recommend allowing a percentage of CCTR program funds to be used as a stock stipend to incentivize infant and toddler teacher recruitment and retention.

A portion of these funds should be dedicated to pay for specific infant and toddler training to help preschool teachers serve those younger children. There is no requirement in the CTC permit for teachers to take infant toddler classes. There is currently an early childhood mental health adjustment factor for CCTR and CSPP programs to help pay for a licensed clinical therapist for the classroom.

The additional funds are minimal and cannot pay for the cost of these professionals and these professionals are very hard to find to truly affect change and help teachers work with children with challenging behaviors and mental health challenges.

We recommend that the additional funds from the early childhood mental health we recommend that additional funds be allocated from the early childhood mental health adjustment factor be allowed to pay for teacher and in classroom training, bringing the teaching pyramid from the center of social emotional foundations, which is referred to as CCephal, to practitioners in the classroom. This tool is specifically designed for teachers and practitioners to have a successful and sustainable approach to ensuring the healthy social and emotional development of the children they serve.

Using existing contract funds to pay for this training costs no extra money and will empower those in the classroom directly working with children and these programs can can be implemented immediately. This additional support for teachers will augment the expertise of licensed clinical therapists. I thank you for the opportunity to be here today.

I appreciate the ability to speak on this issue and I wanted to recommend some real world, immediate recommendations that will dramatically improve the flexibility and reduce the barriers for programs to serve subsidized children in California. I appreciate the Subcommittee's commitment to the field, and I will be happy to answer any questions you may have at the appropriate time. Thank you.

Thank you. Good afternoon. Chair Jackson, Chair Alvarez and Members of the Committee. My name is James Moses. I work for Child Care Resource Center, but today I'm here representing the Inland Empire Children's Cabinet Child Care Subcommitee. This is a Committee that's made up of over 150 Members, and the information that I'll share with you today really comes directly from my colleagues that are working in the child care field.

They are both direct and indirect providers, state and federally funded providers, as well as private pay that serve their center based family, child care, family, friend and neighbor programs. And then in addition, many of our childcare support programs in the Inland Empire participate as part of this cabinet. So I'd like to thank the panelists that spoke all day today. Many of the things that we will share and lift up have already been mentioned in some ways.

I'll highlight some of the most common themes that came up around some of the barriers that Inland Empire providers spoke about. So one was kind of the challenges to find, acquire, and license a building to, you know, not to mention the lack of funding and the cost to this. So a lot of challenges, a lot of red tape. Also acquiring building permits, some of the clearances needed sometimes create other financial demands. Getting invested and connected to the food program.

Finding qualified staff to work in the centers of your family childcare homes. They also talked about the burdensome requirements for eligibility and enrollment in some of the programs. We've heard a lot about the lack of workforce, and that came up regularly. We have a lack of qualified teachers. Some of the more common reasons that were shared that came up a lot were low wages, which is no surprise.

We also heard from a lot of providers about the stress that teachers are feeling, and that connects back to some of the work that was mentioned about making sure we take care of the workforce and support them. But many providers are talking about the challenges of working with children with special needs, challenging behaviors, and there's a lack of support for families and for staff and programs. The associate teacher permit issue came up.

If you're not familiar with that, you can only renew your associate teacher permit one time, so you can be in that permit level for 10 years. And for many folks, when that expires, they are unable to be left alone in the classroom, teach the classroom, and many of those folks are beginning to leave the field as they're teacher permits expire and they can't renew.

We've heard a lot about this, but the rising cost of childcare came up, especially for providers that are looking to move into more infant toddler services where the cost is prohibitive. They also talked about delays in payments and receiving funding as a challenge. Another thing that they brought up was really around parent education, around what kind of childcare and preschool options are available to them. Many of, especially our non TK programs, shared that.

They hear from a lot of parents that they believe TK is a requirement and they're not aware of the options and choices they have, so they're not getting access to the full field. They talked about school district's lack of awareness around options for families, and we've heard from some school districts about that in UPK mixed delivery meetings. They also talked about the limited opportunities available for state preschool expansion dollars where our community based organizations were unable to apply for some of those expansion dollars recently.

Some of the recommendations they lifted up was really to provide and improve collaboration at the state and local level, to increase efficiencies to services that are going to provide better and expanded services for the providers, for children, for families, things like working with community care licensing, which you've heard a little bit about, the building permits that are necessary to open up a building, working in the UPK system contracting issues.

They talked a lot about a concerted effort to build a pipeline that produces teachers and administrators for center based and family child care programs, not just putting money in workforce development, but really create the pathway that leads to this. It needs to include education, training and of course, compensation. They lifted that up time and time again.

They also talked about paid training days that they don't have that available to them and the challenges if they're in state funded programs, CSPP in particular, they'd like to see rates, higher payments that are based on real costs. They want to see families pointed to resource and referral departments, and we heard a little bit about resource and referral departments.

So in addition to the work they do with SIP providers, they provide guidance to families around all the options that are available in their communities and discuss with them kind of what's available to them what might best meet their needs. So they talked about needing more, more funding for that and then also required collaboration between the school districts, the LEAs and the R&Rs. Not all R&Rs or many don't know what TK programs exist.

There's not a lot of communication between them and our Lea school districts aren't aware of the other options that exist in the mixed delivery system, so they can't share that information either. They talked about hold harmless being a blessing over the last several years, but they talked about when we moved forward with a new cost of care quality model, how important it is to be paid on enrollment, not attendance in terms of just benefiting their budget. Planning was a big deal.

I talked a little bit about support for children with special needs and challenging behaviors. They mentioned that title five programs talked about and this is building off what Jackie said about can we use a percentage of our funding to support training and education with our staff? One of the last things they talked a lot about the SIP program, but you've already heard a lot about that. That really comes in handy to serve the outreaching areas.

Riverside and San Bernardino counties have outlying areas that are fairly remote, and many of those areas are served primarily by family, childcare providers, family, friend and neighbor providers that we can support there. Another recommendation they had was let's leverage what we provide in the child care and development fields and the families we serve. In the Inland Empire, we have more than 70,000 children that are state subsidized and we have access to these children through our providers on a daily basis.

We have the ability to connect them to programs that might need their needs, domestic violence programs, health programs, health screenings, the ability to make sure their children are developmentally screened. And we need a better connection to create those collaborations and make sure we connect those children we're already serving to additional services. Thank you so much for the opportunity to share some of the experiences we have in the Inland Empire. We look forward to continuing to work with the Legislature on solutions to move our work forward. So thank you so much.

Absolutely. I'm going to pass it over to Assembly Member Alvarez for his questions.

Thank you, Doctor Jackson. And let me start with this panel. But I'm hopeful that some of the folks from.

So I also heard this issue that I'm curious about learning more about which is the 10 year sunset of the preschool aids. I believe that after 10 years our last testimony explained to us that someone with that credential after 10 years, their credential, it's not repealed, it just. I guess it's sunsets. It's probably the best way to say it.

Is this something you said is becoming more of a concern you're seeing more of I guess more of an exodus than entry into this part of the workforce?

Yeah. In the, in the Inland Empire of the providers that I spoke with to prepare for this, I learned, and I was aware of two already but I learned of a third one that actually have classrooms closed and have had associate teachers whose permit expired leave their, leave their organization to go work elsewhere or if they were able to retain them continue their, through that permit matrix, renew it again, that they could have stayed on those classrooms may be open as a result.

Let me just try to understand. Is that an option to them to renew?

No. So there's several permit levels, I think five, maybe six. Everyone can be renewed unlimited amounts of time. The associate teacher permit is the only one that can only be renewed once. And if by chance I'm mistaken, someone here on the panel can probably correct me.

So issuance with a sunset of 10 years and an additional one time of 10 years.

No. So you, you get the permit, you have five years, you can renew it once for additional five years, total of 10. So. So you have 10 years and then if you don't elevate to the next level then you lose your permit status or you. Okay, you'd have to revert.

I appreciate that. You know, my only thoughts and certainly not being an expert in this field, but is from my personal interactions with my children in the settings. There's some pretty valuable experience from folks, certainly after 10 years that perhaps requiring additional education, which we're not even paying them to do, getting to the point of professional development and issue that was raised here seems like it's something we should think about. Does it make sense to lose the experience which has a value of 10 years?

Because, and I'm sure there was a reason and I'm sure someone will tell me why at some point. It's a good idea to end this at 10 years, but it's something to at least consider and at least from my standpoint, have a further conversation about. But that did bring me to the professional development that individuals have a very difficult choice and so they either go and receive the professional development that they all want to grow and become better at what they do.

People who do this obviously love what they do and they want to be the best at it, but there's a trade off with that, taking the time off because you're not getting paid and therefore there is a cost associated with that. I'm certainly again, that that's another topic that I think is worthwhile of at least exploring. I also heard the very, again, direct recommendation of the outdoor space and that being a potential issue when it comes to increasing accessibility and slots.

And I'm definitely interested in accomplishing that. I don't want to step on the Chairman's toes of his Subcommitee, but I think that sounds of interest if I can plug it now and then. The prioritization on the facilities that serve the students that really, you know, need the subsidized students, as you testified to. I think I just wanted to make those comments and see if there was any reflection on the comments I made. Otherwise, I'd. You'd like to make some comments here. Come on up, please.

Thank you. Chair Kim Johnson California Department of. Social Services

I don't think that microphone is on. Sergeants.

How about now?

Better.

Okay. Kim Johnson, California Department of Social Services we do offer a waiver for outdoor space for community care licensing. So we're happy to make sure that information is accessible and available. And if there's other streamlining within it, we're happy to revisit that, but just wanted to share that with the Committee.

Appreciate that. Any other, anyone feedback on any of the comments I made? Okay, let me ask some questions to. I mean, obviously it's all related, but I appreciate, I believe that the chair asked about this. It's something him and I think see eye to eye on, which is the idea of a rainy day Fund for childcare. I think it's something that is a important tool for our budget in many regards. In education specifically, I have post early childhood k through 12 and community college and universities.

And it's something we're definitely interested in. So I'm glad that was at least explored or talked about when it comes to the implementation of the alternative methodology, though I was, I heard the testimony by childcare united and even from the Lao in terms of, and actually the Department of Education in terms of timing of, of pieces that need to be implemented prior to this even taking effect. And I'm not sure that I either missed or heard what that planning is like.

And it's maybe a question for Department of Finance if those folks are still here from that panel or to the Lao on how we're going to make sure we are implementing this over, essentially, really the next fiscal year, because the implementation occurs the fiscal year after, and we can't just flip a switch. It doesn't just happen. Everything takes time. So anybody can provide any feedback on that, I'd appreciate it.

Jackie Barocio I can at least provide just context in terms of, in statute, various reporting deadlines that we do have associated with the alternative methodology. And looking at statute, it really goes up to July 1, 2024 in which the Department will provide the Federal Government a draft of, again, the General framework of an alternative methodology, but that may not include the actual values of the various components that will make up the actual rate.

But I'm just curious. I mean, we don't have to have values to build a system where the values can be plugged into. I assume maybe I'm too simplistic minded about this, but.

I think in that case, we would recommend asking. I know CDE made comments about potential system changes that will need to be made, and the magnitude of those system changes and the length of time needed for those system changes may be dependent on some of those input definitions. Because if we're requiring now to collect data on a new input, then that's something that we need to add to the existing system.

But I will say beyond that, the Legislature could also consider adopting additional reporting requirements that require some of these implementation milestones at least be identified to the extent like we may not be able to associate a certain dollar amount or say with specificity what system changes would be need, at least acknowledging a system change may be needed and identifying in which departments or for which programs.

Okay. And I saw two brave individuals step up, maybe have some more to provide.

Tamar Webber, Department of Finance so thank you to the Lao. It's right. So as we discussed in a previous panel, July is going to be when we submit the state plan to the ACF, and then there's going to be a period of time until we get approval as far as like system changes like the LAO described, we won't know exactly what system changes need to happen until we know what the final plan is.

But in addition, I want to say that we have put out there the different steps that we think is we need to take over 24-25 to get to that, to full implementation. And Doctor Jaime Mileham can talk about those in more detail.

Yeah. And also let you respond to my question then would be though, from a timeline perspective, we want to implement this again in 25-26. Right. And so is that correct? Okay, so 25-26 is when the rate is supposed to be implemented.

So the reason why you're noticing a bit of a pause is because as this upcoming year we're going to have some concurrent conversations when a course is rate setting. Right. So we have released a report that talks about the key elements, and I think it was referenced earlier, panel, about some of those elements and still having TBD's.

That's right. I heard that.

So definitely want to acknowledge that that is within the conversations, both within what's represented CCPU, as well as those that are not. But the second piece is also conversations with the contractors as well as the fields in regards to the areas that you're lifting up, which is automation, training, guidance. And that is.

So I definitely understand all that, but in just my brief experience here, nothing happens very quickly. And so this is all sounding to me like we still have a lot of work to do and this is not likely to be implemented 25-26. And that then means we'd have to figure out a one year gap at the minimum solution on rates.

So the Administration, I can say, is committed to having further conversations on what that will look like, both knowing what we're going to gather from the field, but also understanding that there has to be more conversations about a start date.

Yeah, no, and again, we don't want to rush this and get it wrong either. Agree, but just to set realistic expectations, because it was my understanding that we were doing this transition. And I think this conversation here makes me get a sense that we might not do this transition when we thought we were doing this transition. We might, but we might not. Sure.

If I may, chair Kim Johnson, Department of Social Services a couple things I just want to point out into the Committee's earlier questions around what we're doing in the interim. I just want to again reference that both the existing MOU with child care providers united and the parity pieces, the cost of plus, payments go through June of 2025. The implementation components that we're discussing that we are kind of to be determined how long we need.

I just want, I don't want to lose hope for 25-26. It's just to be determined and we'll be able to assess that. And we're happy to share back with the Legislature progress on that as that becomes more clear. But I would not necessarily say that we have ruled out that potential implementation of what is put forward in 2526. That's still a possibility.

I guess where I'm, why I'm, I don't want to use the word skeptical, but where I question is, can we actually do this? Is we should be authorizing, or at least be discussing, certainly in the chairs Committee, some budget allocation towards this transition. If we do, if we're all hopeful this is going to happen, then we should have something there to accomplish that. As far as I know, I don't think there's anything in the budget allocated towards this purpose.

Gabby Santoro Department of Finance just for context, want to sort of reference the past two agreements that we have negotiated with CCPU and parity packages that we provided for the non representative field. In terms of order of operations, we would first be negotiating with CCP while concurrently considering what to do for the entire field, making sure that they're not left behind. But it's typical that we don't want to put the cart in front of the horse. We first have these negotiations and then figure out how to implement that and present it to the Legislature for enactment.

Yeah, but if you, you'd have to then wait till next year to present the Legislature with an expenditure expenditure plan to enact that.

That is correct.

Okay. I think that answers the question then, for everybody. It's not in this year budget. Okay, the question on the agenda, I think you might have seen changes on the RMR or the SRR. Are changes necessary to either of these until the full funding for the methodology is identified, particularly to address some of the issues of systemic racism and inequities that exist. As one example, the cap on the local parent pay capacity. I don't know who might feel comfortable answering that question.

Oh, let me give it a shot, and I'll reference to Doctor Jaime-Mileham as well. So again, I want to just appreciate the underscoring of urgency in terms of being able to get additional supplements and resources out to the workforce and programs, hence the cost of care payments I referenced. So the agreement that we've established and the additional resources for those that aren't represented is intended.

Yes, they are one time to the points made earlier on panels, but they are intended to recognize that our current rate structure and methodology isn't fully resourcing in the ways that an alternative methodology that's looking at the cost of care as a component may do. So that is how we are currently addressing the need for additional support for programs in the workforce to both recruit new Members of the workforce as well as retain existing programs.

Okay. Yeah, I think certainly again, questions remain on this transition. Would be interested in helping or hearing what current existing resources exist just for the shifting of the methodology and as it relates to, for example, it costs. That's a very basic, you got to create software, I assume, or there's some pretty basic things that we know will be required or not. It's not in the budget for this year.

So I assume then maybe it will be in the revised, maybe now that we're talking about it, I don't know. But I think those are things we need to be made aware of. But I will stop there and turn it over to Chair Doctor Jackson.

Now everyone knows why Chair Alvarez chairs the budget Subcommitee, certainly. Again, I think that as we begin to transition to a more robust and stable childcare system, obviously each and every one of these components is so important in making sure that we are empowering current providers to have the assistance they need to even be greater benefits. Certainly young people, those providers, are transitioning to infants.

And the type of renovations that requires to be able to make those significant, I mean, those are like super home improvement projects that, you know, are big in terms of the huge renovation costs that those take to be able to transition to infants. Certainly the finding ways to, we are aware of the infrastructure funding requests, by the way, I've personally have been briefed on that as well.

I think the idea is how can we create a more robust, the problem is we kind of have pots here, pots there kind of thing, but not a part of a whole system to making sure they're all connected. And so what I'm trying to do is making sure that as we look at the different compartments, look at the various pots we have for various things, how does it fit into a continuous process that meets the various needs?

We need to get to where we need to go, but ensure that we are doing a long term commitment. And the key part is, number one, there's no doubt the Governor has been a great champion when it comes to what we're trying to do in terms of the child care space. The problem is that we have term limits as well. And how do we create a system that will even continue on in terms of this path, no matter who's the Governor, right. Part of it.

I'm sure it's, you know, the longevity of those of us who are in charge of these, you know, committees at any particular time and whether the speaker keeps us here, you know, but I think this is a long term commitment that we're going to need long term funding towards. And so that's why I know for, for me, I'm going to be looking at ways to put things on the table so that we can really solve this.

And again, it's my personal priority to create this more long term funding streams that will not only deal with issues of rate reform, but the infrastructure needs, the desert needs. In terms of sips. Right. I'm going to be an honorary sipper. I would like a certificate, please. Just letting you know. And a cup. Thank you very much. A sippy cup with my name on it, please. But thank you all very much for, number one, the work that you do.

You have been holding this state down even when times have been rough. We have a long ways to go to even just get to where we were before the pandemic. And then, of course, going even further with that. I'm thinking of having a further listening session over our summer break, particularly on childcare, so that we can actually have possibly a legislative and budgetary package for next year to continue to move this baby forward.

And usually when I do listening sessions like this, we're not going to be in a panel. We're all going to be, you know, there will be food. But the idea is getting out of this kind of formal thing and kind of going to brainstorming because we've got to solve these problems. And I might as well just say this. I'm also frustrated that there's so many problems, but I also, when I ask for possible solutions, I don't get many of those. See what I'm saying?

And so I'm hoping as we can take this into a different environment, we can kind of help each other think through these issues so that we can come with tangible solutions that will really move, move the needle forward. Because a lot of these things is not about budget either. There's some policy things, too.

You know, I have, if you go into my office, there's something on my office called the fire Marshall fix, right, where the fire marshal is requiring more than what community care licensing is requiring. And in some cases, you know, for instance, if you have an outdoor space. You have to do a whole construction project to have those covered things, which is enormous cost. But then I'm wondering, well, can we provide a more costly alternative that provides the same needs, right.

So that if the fire marshal is requiring it, we can say, well, hold on, I don't have to get that. I might be able to do this and still reef still meet that same requirement. Right. Like we really got to dig into these barriers. I'm probably saying this too soon, but, you know, I want to eliminate permit fees that cities can put on child care centers and facilities. Facilities, right. Because it does a public good, you know, I mean, all those type of things, you know, I can feel the letters coming now.

Well, if I may chair, as you know, and I wonder if this is an inspiration, the Legislature did eliminate city permitting fees for family childcare through SB 234. And in fact, as a former City Council Member, I would say that I think that at least limiting licensing and permitting fees at the local level for childcare is something I think the Legislature could explore.

And I think it could be an add on to existing rules and regulations which also somewhat address the fire marshal concerns, which if you talk to the state fire marshal, will say, yes, we get this information out. But then there's still some sort of a disconnect at the local level. And so local jurisdictions, some are taking it on and some are not taking it on.

And in Riverside County, we've just done a survey of all of the cities and to understand their fees related to child care centers and to family child care, as well as their zoning permitting processes. We're just waiting for approval from the county to release all the findings, but we'll have them, at least for Riverside County, and look forward to staying in conversation with you about what other support the state Legislature could provide.

Fantastic. Thank you so much for that. So, anyway, look forward to an invitation to many of you or all of you to come back up here to Sacramento to kind of dive a little bit deeper into this and see if we can all come up with something we can all move forward with for next year. Thank you all very much. Yep. Now is going to be our time. Well, first of all, let me say this.

I'm going to say something that's going to cause you all to jump up. Don't jump up. Okay? Because I need you all to hear me. We're going to begin a public comment on the information items. And basically, though, what's going to be important is please only limit your comments to the information that has been on the agenda thus far. All right? Don't be trying to add in the other items that we're gonna be going into next, so you can go home, all right? You.

You stuck with me. All right? If I gotta be here, you gotta be here, too. All right? So just make your way up to the microphone again. That's only on the first five items that we're going towards. Just a minute. I'm going to ask people to take your conversations outside, please. This is for public comment. And just state your name and affiliation, please. And we are doing how much? How many? Two minutes. Two minutes. And then we need you to wrap it up. Okay?

Thank you. Mister Chairman, my name is Jeff Frost. I'm here representing a number of organizations. The Orange County Department of Education, the Association of Suburban School Districts, Marin County office, and I've been asked to also represent the Association of California School Administrators. I want to speak specifically to the issue that both Mister Alvarez and Mister Meratsucci commented on regarding the TK penalties that some districts are experiencing. We strongly support a fix on this issue.

We have had the opportunity to talk with Miss Gable and others about the issue. We want to make it clear that our request is to fix the problem only for the existing year. Our clients can adapt to the existing quote unquote, deal of the ratio at 10 to one, but we're unable to do so as has been discussed for the current year. We appreciate your consideration. Thank you.

Thank you. Name and affiliation, please?

Thank you very much for the opportunity and for your very good questions today. Celine Krimston. I'm with ECE Voices and I'm also from educational enrichment system. Came up from San Diego. I'm here representing 200 employees at our 19 high quality sites. I'm here to express first appreciation for the one time needed funding that has kept our doors open, as well as made some amazing facility improvements. However, this is a Budget Committee, so you know and I know I cannot give. That's all right.

You don't have to. You don't have to take him out. This is his. This is his hearing. You're okay.

We cannot make.

Matter of fact, bring him up to the microphone. He got something to say.

Agreed. We cannot make improvements to our wages, to our staff with one time funding. And we very much urge the ongoing needed cost care rate. Thank you.

Mm hmm. Next. Name and affiliation, please.

Hi, I'm Brianna Birx. I'm with Parent Voices, Contra Costa. I've been a CNA for on and off 12 years and was never told about childcare. Only recently did I get childcare for my youngest child at a subsidized center. The other two haven't been enrolled yet. I work at night. I work nights, sometimes days. And. And I need childcare for all my kids. I'm here for the hundreds of thousands of kids on the waiting list who need care now.

I'm here for thousands of, for thousands of providers who deserve better wages and will help them serve more kids. Please Fund childcare with no delays. Thank you.

Thank you. Name and affiliation, please? And everyone else, can you please move up so that you can create more space for other people? Come move on up.

My name is Lachey, and I'm a parent leader with Parent Voices. This is my son, Matthew. He's taking a good nap. And my daughter June, she's not with me right now, but right now my kids stay with my mom during the day. But even though I'm grateful for my mom stepping up and taking care of them, that's not the option I would choose, especially because my mom doordashes with my kids in a car. So in a perfect world, they would be getting.

They would be in a good place where they. Where they would have trained teachers who can teach them the basics so they could start kindergarten ready to go. They would be in a clean, safe environment, getting three nutritionists and healthy meals a day. And they'd have teachers who really cared for them and took care of their well being and made them feel safe. So child care providers do important work. They should not be punished for taking families with the subsidy.

And also who wants to leave their kids with someone who's financially stressed. If my subsidy amount was higher, then it would allow me to have access to the type of care I want for my kids. This low subsidy amount makes it hard for providers to take subsidies, harder for them to serve families like mine and harder to keep their doors open. I am not the only family in California with a subsidy who just cannot find a provider. There are so many more people in my exact situation. Thank you.

Thank you. Name, affiliation, please? Didn't want to wait his turn.

Hi, my name is Harney Schaberks. I'm with Parent Voices. I'm so sorry. I'm with Parent Voices of Contra Costa County. I've worked for the post office for the last five years. And when I went on maternity leave with my youngest, I had to. I was on maternity leave. I want to go back to work, but I can't without childcare. I also need childcare during the night because I work graveyard. I'm here to ask that you.

I'm here to ask that you do not delay childcare for the thousands of families who need childcare and to support our child care workers who can't survive on poverty wages. Please invest in childcare.

Thank you. I know his name. His name is trouble.

He's done really good. I've been here all day. I'm Mary Ignatius. I'm the Executive Director of Parent Voices California. We're asking the Committee to reject the pause of the 20,000 slots because we have thousands of families who are waiting and to support CCPU and the ECU coalition's ask around the true cost of care. I really believe that we should be having budget hearings about the $70 billion in tax breaks that our state budget and taxpayers pay for.

Instead of trying to choose which of these programs we should prioritize, there is plenty of tax breaks that we should be calling on to Fund the programs that California really needs. Thank you.

Yeah. Why don't you give me a list of those tax breaks?

All right.

I will.

Good afternoon. Monique Ramos, on behalf of the ECE Coalition, I just want to take a moment to thank the chairs, the Committee, the Legislative Women's Caucus and the staff for putting on a really robust hearing to have a comprehensive discussion about where we are in ECE today. But I also really want to underscore the points of those who testified today. We need a clear implementation plan for the alternative methodology.

And we cannot forget that we have a funding cliff coming next year for providers if they do not have some sort of sustainable rate increase. And then lastly, to the mothers who were just here moments ago, we clearly need those additional spaces released, and we need a plan for the remainder of the spaces that if we don't get all the 50,000 supposedly that are owed under the 200,000 promise that we know when the remainder are coming so that families and providers can plan. Thank you.

Thank you. Name and affiliation please.

Good afternoon. My name is Andrea Fernandez Mendoza with California Children's Academy, and I'm here on behalf of Every Child California and ECE voices. In my program in Los Angeles County, I serve over 700 infants, toddlers and preschoolers on a daily basis during COVID You are our heroes. You provided us the ability to stay open and provide truly universal childcare for all families. So thank you.

We are asking for this continued support as it is truly a social justice issue, as the majority of people it affects are black, indigenous, persons of color and their children. We are asking for the immediate allocation of all funded ECE spaces by June 30 we request a transparent, collaborative plan with centers to develop a fair alternative rate system. We support the childcare revision as programs need that extra support to survive and to be viable in the economy that we have today in California.

I fully support Donna Sneeringer's comments, Jacqueline Wyse'scomments, and the ECE coalition's stance. And again, thank you for all you've done for our programs this past few years.

Thank you. Name and affiliation, please.

Hello, good afternoon. My name is Nina Buthee. I'm the Executive Director of Every Child California. Happy to be here today with every child California and all of our ECE voices. Folks. It's a coalition of center based practitioners here today. I would like to align my comments with my fellow ECE advocates on ensuring that we do have a cost of care rate as well as not pausing the spot spaces.

As you can tell, we desperately need them, both our center based spaces and our family child care spaces. I also want to express my strong support for the creation of the reversion account for ECE programs. There is so much fun, so much money that needs to be retained within the ECE system. We need to use those funds to serve children.

Also, I would like to note that the waiver that Miss Wyse was talking about is slightly different than the waiver that the Department of Social Services currently offers. So I am happy to follow up with staff and to give some specific recommendations on what we can do to help that. Thank you.

Thank you very much. Name and affiliation, please.

Good afternoon. Sara Bachez with Children Now and a proud coalition partner with the ECE coalition. Our carmens are going back to ensuring that there is a strong transition plan as we phase in an alternative methodology that really honors the true cost of care, lifting up all families, childcare providers, as well as our educators who have sacrificed so much.

And then on comment on issue two, on part two of the agenda, we strongly support those recommendations of creation of the reversion account, so we are very appreciative of today's discussion. Thank you.

Thank you. Name and affiliation, please.

Good afternoon. Karina Laigo with the Child Care Law Center, proud Member of the ECE coalition. We urge the Legislature to not eliminate the penalty on school districts for TK classrooms that don't meet the ratio and class size requirements. Waiving the penalty would remove district incentive to meet the base minimum of safe adult to child ratio requirement. This in turn, removes an important safeguard of our young children's health and safety and should not be allowed.

Child care providers are also subject to penalties if they don't meet ratio requirements. We recommend the Legislature focus on creating a truly universal TK system where parents can choose a no cost option when any childcare setting, including community based setting or family childcare, which currently has space, meets the ratio requirements and the developmental needs of young children. We also urge the Legislature to implement and Fund the alternative methodology to ensure a fair wage for providers.

The promised childcare spaces also must be released to meet the 200,000 spaces promised by 2526. Thousands of families are waiting on state childcare and they need it now. Lastly, we urge the Legislature to create a Reserve Fund for money that is earmarked for childcare to make sure that it stays in childcare. Thank you.

Thank you. Name and affiliation, please?

Yes, hi there. My name is Ken Herron. Myself, my wife and my sister in law operate four preschools in Selma. I'm also a Member of ECU voices in every child California, and I want to agree with everyone that we really do need to keep the rollout of the CCTR spaces, that infant toddler spaces the promised 200,000. We need to continue that even in the face of this bleak budget situation.

I also just want to be complimentary of the Legislature and also the two chairs of these committees that I've just spent 6 hours listening to because you guys get it and you care, and we need your help on this cost of care thing because it does need to get fixed in the next three months before that gets submitted. We need to make sure that all the formulas and whatever's in there is correct. It is right for all players family homes, all the way to centers.

It needs to be fair for all of us. And I appreciate the fact that you want to get involved in this and have more hearings because you realize, as I've told other people, you guys gave us one opportunity to change something that we've been trying to do for probably decades, at least the last 10 years. We have this opportunity. It'll never come again in my lifetime. So I want, we need to make the most of it. So thank you very much.

Thank you very much. Name and affiliation, please.

Hi, good afternoon. Ofelia Medina with first Avla. We are here to align our comments with those of our partners in the ECE coalition. We know that the first five years are a critical window of opportunity during a young child's development that can have long term implications for the health and well being during those critical years.

Children need a support and safe and stable, nurturing relationship and environments, and these are provided by the providers that many times not only care for the children themselves, but for the whole family. This is why we align our comments to those of the EC coalition and specifically ask to Fund and stay true to the commitment of 200,000 spaces, and that we adequately address provider rates by developing an alternative methodology that covers the true cost of care. Thank you.

Thank you. Name and affiliation, please.

Hello. Katie Duberg, California Work and Family Coalition. We are a statewide alliance of organizations and individuals united in the belief that all people deserve the time and resources to care for themselves and each other. We know that paid family and medical leave and access to childcare are absolutely essential supports for working families in California. I want to align my comments with those of Members of the ECE coalition.

A budget is a statement of values, and we believe that children, families and those who care for children should be among our highest priorities. Thank you.

Thank you. Name an affiliation, please.

Good afternoon. Linda Asato with the California Childcare Resource and Referral Network and also a Member of the ECE coalition in support of the alternative methodology as well as the release of the promised slots. But I'm here to talk about the last panel. Item five, the access or barriers to access in the infrastructure. Just want to reiterate that the child care resource and referral agencies are a part of, of the ECE infrastructure in California.

We're in every county and have deep reach in communities, serve as eyes and ears for the state, be able to provide resources and back information to the state. But the R&R system is very severely underfunded. I think, as noted in this, that they recently have gotten $10 million in addition. And that's on average, or I would say the median r and r contract is about $377,000.70. 1% of them get less than the average contract. And so that really only funds a few people, plus their infrastructure.

So for all the things that they're supposed to do, reach parents, support providers, it's not very much money, and they have a lot of geography. There's a lot of unseen support that they do, especially with all the languages that they provide information to us. So I just wanted to add that it's an important part of the infrastructure and could really make a big difference in expanding access and eliminating some of the barriers. So thank you.

Thank you very much. Name and affiliation, please.

Mister chair Darby Kernan. I'm representing Grace End Child Poverty California, as well as the first five Association of, California, which represents all 58 counties. First fives. We want to align our comments with those of the CCPU Parent Voices and the ECE coalition. We understand the state's fiscal outlook isn't great, but the promise to families and providers must be fulfilled. Our budget, as previously stated, is a statement of our values in children's and families, and those who care for children should be among our highest priorities. Thank you.

Thank you. Name and affiliation, please.

Hi, I'm Dora Dotto from Cameo Network, a network made up of 400 organizations that are dedicated to helping small businesses with loans, credits, business technical assistance and other business services. Annually. Our Members serve about 200 very small businesses, including child care businesses. Last year, our women's business center Members assisted almost 450 childcare businesses, resulting in the creation of 3500 childcare slots.

Ready nations new report finds that the lack of reliable childcare for working parents of young children up to the age of three costs California $17 billion in lost earnings, productivity and revenue every year. Their report outlines how much the lack of childcare costs families, businesses and taxpayers, so we must strengthen our infrastructure. Investments in childcare are investments in our economy.

On behalf of Ready Nation California, which is a Member of the ECE Coalition, in Cameo, I asked the Committee to support implementing a single reimbursement rate structure in distributing the subsidized childcare spaces appropriated in the January budget proposal. Thank you.

Thank you. Name and affiliation, please.

Good afternoon, Monica Mahajan with the California Childcare Resource and Referral Network and I would like to speak to align my comments against the Members of the ECE coalition, including the ECE spaces and the cost of care care based provider rates. I'd also like to echo the comments by Linda Asado previously regarding the underfunding of the resource and referral system and the importance of that system throughout California. And finally, I'd like to echo parent Voice's comments about pursuing lost revenue from tax breaks as a means to support family supports. Thank you.

Thank you very much. Name, affiliation, please.

Good afternoon. Raquel Morales on behalf of the Education Trust West, we want to align our comments with those of the ECE budget coalition. Access to ECE programs can significantly improve a family's ability to work, attend school, and improve its overall quality of life. We understand the fiscal outlook, but we believe that the state must urgently address rates in order to cover the true cost of care. Thank you.

Thank you very much. Name and affiliation, please. oh, you're the last one.

All right, close us out, baby.

All right, here we go. Lilly. Start with the California Childcare Resource and referral network. I just want to align my comments with those of the ECE. Particularly, I want to emphasize the live experiences of those who spoke today, especially since close to 2 million children are still waiting to receive care access to ECE programs directly, ties to families, abilities to work, attend school, and improve the overall quality of their life. So I'm here to urge you to find to Fund the remaining 50,000 ECE spaces from the 2021 and 2022 budget, as well as the creation of the reversion account.

Thank you very much. I want to thank everyone very much for your participation. Hopefully you understand the seriousness in which we are going about doing this and making sure that we do right by the next generation through our child care early childhood education programs. We will adjourn our informational hearing and then we will gavel back in shortly for our budget hearing. That's.

Okay, we are back. We are back. Vacation is over. The remainder of today's business are ECE action items from the governors. zero, those of you in the back got to step out our ECE action items from the governor's January budget. Public comment on all items will be at the end of all three panels and ask folks to be prepared for 1 minute. If you have already participated in public comment during the informational hearing in regards to slots, we let you know now. We heard you.

We don't need to hear you. Again, thank you so much. Once again, I am pleased to have our comprehensive ECE proposals heard today as a Joint Hearing. The Assembly continues to support a balanced approach to universal preschool implementation in line with the full child care ecosystem and its crucial role for working families and developing children. Again, want to thank my colleague for his willingness to have this Joint Hearing, and I will then now pass it on to him to lead us off with issue number one.

Thank you, chair Doctor Jackson, for helping convene today. And we are going to be taking this first panel on the issue of transitional kindergarten facilities and in particular the January budget proposal to delay the $550 million in new funding for these facilities. As we discussed earlier, the implementation of TK requires facilities themselves, and so some of those more specifically questions I had I've saved for this particular panel. This proposal was adopted in the Legislature's part of AB 106 in the early action of this year.

However, the policy and fiscal implications of this delay merit a full discussion, which we would like to have here today. We may need to take further action on TK facilities policy this year to prevent further roadblocks of successful UTK implementation and scale. And more importantly, I would say, to what extent does this perhaps create a potential challenge and perhaps conversation about delay full implementation of TK, if that's what this requires.

So with that, I'd welcome the Department of Finance, Legislative Analyst, Office of Public School Construction and Department of Education, and if we can go in that order, I think that makes most sense. So welcome.