Gov. Mike Dunleavy wants it to be easier and more affordable for mothers and fathers to put their kids in childcare facilities while they work.
To this end he has established a special task force charged with developing a strategy to improve the availability and affordability of programs that care for young children while their parents are away.
According to an April 6 announcement, the governor’s 11-member task force will form a strategic plan to present to him in December. In part, the group will look at how to address the fact that Alaska has lost nearly 10% of its licensed child care providers since January 2020, and more licensed facilities are anticipated to close after federal pandemic relief is spent.
“Access to quality childcare is extremely important to working families,” Dunleavy stated on April 6. “Healthy families and a healthy economy go hand in hand, and improving access to childcare is essential for both.”
The idea expending state funds and resources to expand childcare options so that parents can leave their children in childcare while spending more time a work is not without critics.
State Health Commissioner Heidi Hedberg added that healthy families start with “ensuring access to quality childcare.”
Heidi Teshner, the state’s acting education and early development commissioner, argued that parents need childcare options so they can be “empowered to give their best efforts at work … knowing their children are being cared for in a safe and healthy environment.”
The idea expending state funds and resources to expand childcare options so that parents can leave their children in childcare while spending more time a work is not without critics.
Cardus, a leading non-partisan think tank based in Canada, has done extensive research on state efforts to expand childcare institutions.
Cardus notes that programs to help families should take into account that most parents choose to care for their young children at home. The group emphasizes that any government initiative should provide “equal funding for all families regardless of care type” and stop “violating the principle of free choice without discrimination.”
Cardus and other groups have argued that increased state spending on childcare only benefits those who opt to place their kids in these facilities, while actually burdening stay-at-home parents with additional taxes to fund these programs.
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Collaborating with childcare workers, academics, parents and others, Cardus published a detailed vision for childcare which takes into account families who prioritize caring for their children at home. Titled: “A Positive Vision for Child Care Policy Across Canada,” the document is supported by a wide range of signatories.
Dunleavy’s task force will work on finding ways to promote childcare expansion through recruitment, retention, added benefits and the reduction of regulations that pose barriers to licensed childcare programs. They will also look at ways to incentivize employer-sponsored childcare facilities or benefits and offer recommendations on ways to foster public-private partnerships addressing childcare workforce and affordability. There is no mention of how the state might also support stay-at-home parents who do not want their children to spend large amounts of the day under professional childcare supervision.
18 Comments
No we don’t want to live like slaves anymore handing over our children for the state to abuse and brainwash. No thank you. How about making it easier for mothers to stay home with their children by reducing the cost of living in Alaska? How can we do that?
Agree.
Agree, and my sister-in-law looked into opening one and it is so regulated and burdensome that the government is the one making it difficult for the private citizen to do it. My cousin had one years ago but because of the same reason she stopped doing it.
Don’t worry about child care, after all its an oxymoron to put the term “care “ at the end of child in a state that seems preoccupied with the abuse of children (ocs) and a school system saturated with overtly sexualizing these same kids! Child care is not a real thing anymore and we can thank the AOC of the north for that! Our governor!!!
At a time when we have discovered that our schools are out-of-control and we have businesses all over the state participating in a narrative that is not beneficial for the continuation of mankind? No thank you. There were programs out there to help families – what happened to those programs? I agree with Maxine about making everything more affordable (like it once was in…the 40s or 50s?). I would do my best to keep my kids out of any government-funded operations!!! You’d find out that they “vaccinated” your kids, taught them all the latest and “greatest” trendy ideologies, and taught them to lie to you and hate you. No thank you.
Here’s a thought: how about raising your own kids? Worked for mom, probably will work for everyone else, too.
Having the majority of the last couple of generations of children raised in so-called “childcare” is why we have many of the problems that exist now.
How about an economy in which it only takes one income to thrive?
We don’t need a nanny state. For a “conservative”, Dunny doesn’t seem to understand much about conservative values. Any state facilities for daycare will end up being infiltrated with wokies and groomers. Doesn’t take much brain to figure out that is what they do.
“Childcare facilities” of the past (1880-1970) were called orphanages. Parents and adults were purposely exposed to deadly diseases. Children were sent to these facilities where they were taught to obey, do as they were told, think a certain way, talk a certain way and they were abused mentally and physically. Would be interesting to see what life would have been like if the globalists did not think that they should have control of the entire world deciding who lives, who dies, and what kind of lifestyles everyone will have. Dunleavy, introducing more government-controlled facilities is a globalist move. Who would these facilities really benefit? The illegals that have been flooding into our country? No more government programs.
And to complete your comments Foh no more dunleavy, why are we so slow to demand he step down or impeach him? Beware the likes of Amy Demboski and Susanne downing protect this < a man! Please wake up to the infiltration of judeo/Christian conservatives! Dunleavy should stand tall,he won’t, we need to stand firm!
Why not introduce a bill where child care starts within the family circle. Leaving out carrots, of giving out money within the government, for the system to be abused again, along with our precious gift from Our Heavenly Father, Jehovah, our children.
I think that child care needs to start within the family circle or within the Church (if they attend Church). Just listened to a speaker from Beacon Hill talking about their program here in Alaska to help families stay together by working to keep the family together with the hope of avoiding foster care or OCS. However, if children do end up in foster care of OCS, Beacon Hill works with the family so that the children can see their parent in person or via zoom calls. An ideal situation to me is to get the government out of childcare and child-rearing and put those responsibilities back in the hands of the families, the churches and the community.
I attended same beacon mtg. I’m great full for the effort but realistically I’m tired of being put in positions that force my compassion side to be responsive and my discerning side to declare BS! This problem is already being funded by millions of tax dollars and the results are abusive and a non responsive Ocs!
Then because and I mean directly because this assininine dunleavy administration who can’t do anything right except to expand its obese waistline , compassionate people feel obligated to step up and save the innocent children!!! Talk about schizophrenia , this has got to stop and the governor and his government need a lip lashing that can be heard all the way in Seattle! Sounds like he will be at Wasilla library 6pm Saturday night! Bring your mega phones and let him know your thoughts!
I agree with just about all of the above posts. I voted for Dunleavy and I prayed that he would try to become more like DeSantis and make Alaska back to the Conservative Christian type state that we used to be. I’m so old school that I don’t have any kid or grandchildren in school. All of our kids actually moved to Florida go figure. With all of this WOKENESS BS, transgender crap and the rainbow/trans sexualization in school libraries we as parents need to take care of our children at home and don’t farm them out to these re-education day care centers. We have gotten so’oo far away from family/ friends and become hooked on the worst drug of all and that is the cell phone & this social media.
Look at the headline “dunleavy wants to get your kids into government child care “!!! Do you people finally get who this guy is and what he is doing? I have been exposing the Dunleavy fraud for some time now! Apparently people are extremely slow to make assessments on what they consider to be shallow evidence, but this is more than enough of a clue to understand what he is about isn’t it? Remove the influence of the parents and allow government intrusion where it indoctrinates and does irreversible harm to YOUR CHILDREN! When a society allows its children to be taken like this you know the end is near! You’ve had fair warning!!!!
I agree Dave. The more responsibility we give the government for our children, the more responsibility they take from us and they make laws so that we have no say so in our children’s lives (kinda like going on now right?). Horrifying.
By modern logic, if it costs more for child care than a mother can make in the marketplace, then society should pay any price to have the mother working.
If you want low wages, then double the work force.
Corporate America gets lower wages. The government gets to tax another laborer. The children have absentee parents. Karl Marx for the win!
The “logic” of needing both parents working relies upon ignoring the lower wages from doubling the supply of labor.
How about no, and making some incentives for mothers to stay home and raise their own children, instead of trusting them to strangers.