Long overlooked, child care industry may finally get a permanent lifeline from Beacon Hill – Boston Globe
By Samantha J. Gross
Inside the airy nursery room of the Nurtury child care center, program director Ronda Atkins-Martinez reached to move 4-month-old Davion out of the sun that was beaming through the windows of the Roxbury facilities.
Atkins-Martinez was doing double duty; the day before, one of three educators assigned to the infant room quit, leaving Nurtury at minimal staffing for those children. Whenever one of the remaining two teachers needed a break, or is out sick, another staff member or assistant must step in to help.
The staffing shortage is the latest sign of ongoing problems roiling not only Nurtury Early Education, but the entire child care industry…
For the first time in recent memory, all three key decision makers on Beacon Hill — Governor Maura Healey, Senate President Karen E. Spilka, and House Speaker Ronald J. Mariano — have explicitly said they want to tackle the issue, expressing support for legislation that would infuse the child care sector with public funding, much like K-12 schools already receive. It aims to create a five-year blueprint to provide child care and preschool for all families, and bump up the value of child care subsidies awarded to the state’s neediest families.
On the campaign trail and in her inaugural address, Healey committed to an expanded child tax credit and voiced support for the Common Start legislation being pushed by a network of groups advocating for publicly funded, universal early-childhood education.