It’s a Tuesday morning at 7:15 a.m. and your three-year-old is running a temp. Your mind races with thoughts like: Do we need to see a doctor? Is my other child sick too? Oh no, I have an 8:00 meeting in 45 minutes, how am I going to get through all this and get to work on time?
Here in Iowa, child care is an essential and under emphasized tool for our state to develop, grow, and retain a reliable workforce. A 2020 Study conducted by the US Chamber of Commerce Foundation, along with Iowa Association of Business and Industry (ABI), found that, annually, child care issue result in and estimated $935 million loss for Iowa’s economy. And, an estimated $153 million loss in tax revenue. Additionally, absences and turnover cost Iowa employers an estimated $781 million every year.
Millions of American families rely on access to child care in order to work. Without access to affordable care, parents can’t earn a living, businesses can’t recruit and retain reliable workers, and children miss out on early childhood opportunities. These first few years of a child’s life are a crucial developmental period during which they are continuously learning, forming more than a million neural connections every second. Providing children with nurturing, enriching care when they are not with their parents is a vital investment in their safety, health, and cognitive development during and important state in life.
Linn County has lost 23% of its child care providers in the past five years. Due to COVID-19 the situation has become even more dire as both licensed centers and in-home providers are closing at alarming rates. We really don’t know the true impact of lack of child care and COVID-19 has had on Mt. Vernon and Lisbon. The local unit of the League of Women Voters (LWV) is currently surveying our community to better understand our local child care needs and we need your help. During the month of March, you are encouraged to let us know about your child care experience. If you have already completed the survey, thanks so much! If you haven’t there is still time to let us know what matters most to you. Do you have access, to stable, quality and affordable child care? What are your biggest worries about child care in your family? The LWV would like to better understand what Lisbon and Mt. Vernon parents are facing relative to child care in our community.
Child care is key to attracting and retaining workforce, with 85% of parents saying they would leave their job for one with more family-friendly benefits. And 65% of parents say they are late to work or leave early because of child care issues. We need creative collaborations with local businesses and community involvement that lead to better solutions to meet our child care challenges. Please consider taking 5-10 minutes to complete the child care survey so that we all have a better sense of our communities child care needs.