The administration is withholding more than $6 billion in federal grants for after-school and summer programs, English language instruction, adult literacy and more as part of a review to ensure grants align with President Donald Trump’s priorities.

The move leaves states and schools in limbo as they budget for programs this summer and in the upcoming school year, introducing new uncertainty about when — or if — they will receive the money. It also sets the stage for a clash with Democrats, who say the administration is flouting the law by holding back money Congress appropriated.

Without the money, schools say they won’t be able to provide free or affordable after-school care for low-income kids while their parents work, and they may not be able to hire staff to teach children who are learning English. Even classes or camps underway this summer could be in jeopardy.

For instance, the Boys and Girls Clubs of America depend on some of the withheld money to run camps and other summer programming for low-income students. If funding isn’t restored soon, the programming may end mid-season, said Boys and Girls Club President Jim Clark.

Day camp providers and schools are warning that a Trump administration funding freeze could wreck summer for low-income American families and wipe out some after-school programming next year.

The administration is withholding more than $6 billion in federal grants for after-school and summer programs, English language instruction, adult literacy and more as part of a review to ensure grants align with President Donald Trump’s priorities.

The move leaves states and schools in limbo as they budget for programs this summer and in the upcoming school year, introducing new uncertainty about when — or if — they will receive the money. It also sets the stage for a clash with Democrats, who say the administration is flouting the law by holding back money Congress appropriated.

Without the money, schools say they won’t be able to provide free or affordable after-school care for low-income kids while their parents work, and they may not be able to hire staff to teach children who are learning English. Even classes or camps underway this summer could be in jeopardy.

For instance, the Boys and Girls Clubs of America depend on some of the withheld money to run camps and other summer programming for low-income students. If funding isn’t restored soon, the programming may end mid-season, said Boys and Girls Club President Jim Clark.

“The Department remains committed to ensuring taxpayer resources are spent in accordance with the President’s priorities and the Department’s statutory responsibilities,” Education Department officials wrote in the notice, which was obtained by The Associated Press.

The department referred questions to the Office of Management and Budget, which did not respond to a request for comment.

After-school child care at risk

In Gadsden City Schools in Alabama, officials say they’ll have no choice but to shutter their after-school program serving more than 1,200 low-income students if federal funds aren’t released. There’s no other way to make up for the frozen federal money, said Janie Browning, who directs the program.

Families who rely on after-school programs would lose an important source of child care that keeps children safe and engaged while their parents work. The roughly 75 employees of the district’s after-school programs may lose their jobs.

“Those hours between after school and 6 o’clock really are the hours in the day when students are at the most risk for things that may not produce great outcomes,” Browning said. “It would be devastating if we lost the lifeline of afterschool for our students and our families.”

Jodi Grant, executive director of the Afterschool Alliance, said withholding the money could cause lasting damage to the economy.

Some advocates fear the grants are being targeted for elimination, which could force schools to cut programs and teachers. Trump’s 2026 budget proposal called for Congress to zero out all of the programs under review, signaling the administration sees them as unnecessary.

Sen. Patty Murray, D-Wash., pressed the administration to spend the money as Congress intended.

“Every day that this funding is held up is a day that school districts are forced to worry about whether they’ll have to cut back on afterschool programs or lay off teachers instead of worrying about how to make sure our kids can succeed,” Murray said in a statement.

What the money funds

The six grant programs under review include one known as 21st Century Community Learning Centers. It’s the primary federal funding source for after-school and summer learning programs and supports more than 10,000 local programs nationwide, according to the Afterschool Alliance. Every state runs its own competition to distribute the grants, which totaled $1.3 billion this fiscal year.

Also under review are $2 billion in grants for teachers’ professional development and efforts to reduce class size; $1 billion for academic enrichment grants, often used for science and math education and accelerated learning; $890 million for students who are learning English; $376 million to educate the children of migrant workers; and $715 million to teach adults how to read.

These programs account for over 20% of the federal money the District of Columbia receives for K-12 education, according to an analysis by the Learning Policy Institute, a think tank. California alone has at least $800 million in limbo, while Texas has more than $660 million.

“Trump is illegally impounding billions of dollars appropriated by Congress to serve students this fiscal year,” said Tony Thurmond, California’s state superintendent, in a statement. “The Administration is punishing children when states refuse to cater to Trump’s political ideology.

The loss of funds could “put several more school districts in extreme financial distress,” said Chris Reykdal, superintendent of public instruction in Washington state. Districts have already adopted budgets, planned programming and hired staff, assuming they’d receive the money, Reykdal said.

If the funding freeze remains, children learning English and their parents would be especially affected. Some districts use the money to pay for summer programming designed for English learners, family engagement specialists who can communicate with parents and professional development training for staff. Rural districts would be hit the hardest.

“They’re trying to send a message,” said Amaya Garcia, who oversees education research at New America, a left-leaning think tank. “They don’t believe that taxpayer funding should be used for these children.”

Umatilla School District in rural eastern Oregon — with a sizable population of migrant families and students learning English — relies heavily on federal funding for its after-school and summer school programs. Superintendent Heidi Sipe says she is meeting with state officials soon to find out if the district will have to plan an early end to summer school, an option 20% of students are using. Come this fall, if federal money stays frozen, she’ll have to lay off staff and eliminate after-school programs attended by around half the district’s students.

“It’s an essential service in our community because we don’t have any licensed child care centers for school-age children,” she said.

Sipe said it’s particularly frustrating to deal with these funds being put into limbo because the school district was in the middle of a five-year grant period.

“It feels preventable,” she said, “and it feels as though we could have done a better job planning for America’s children.”

The post Trump administration withholds over $6 billion for after-school, summer programs and more appeared first on The Hemet & San Jacinto Chronicle.

SEATTLE (AP) — After Bryan Kang’s son was born in July, the occupational therapist and his wife, a teacher, started looking for child care in the Los Angeles area. The couple called eight day care centers: Some didn’t have spots for months; others stopped taking their calls and some never answered at all.

So with no viable options, Kang scrambled to find a new job that would allow him to work remotely.

“I told my manager, ‘Hey, by the end of the month, I have to transition out,’” Kang said. “They were very supportive and very understanding because they’re all mothers. But now there’s one less body to see patients.”

Kang said he’s fortunate he found a job teaching online classes, but the unexpected career pivot forced him to take an 11% pay cut.

The truth is, even if he could find a day care spot for his now 3-month-old son, the $2,500 monthly cost of infant care is so high that taking a lower-paying job so he can work from home and care for the baby is the most financially sensible thing to do.

The child care business has for years operated in a broken, paradoxical market: low wages for workers and high costs for consumers. Yet the critical service somehow managed to limp along.

Now, the pandemic has made clear what many experts had long warned: The absence of reliable and affordable child care limits which jobs people can accept, makes it harder to climb the corporate ladder and ultimately restricts the ability of the broader economy to grow.

“Early learning is no longer seen as just a women’s issue or a children’s issue. It’s really seen as an economic issue. It’s about workforce participation,” said Mario Cardona, policy chief for Child Care Aware of America. “It’s about employers who don’t have to worry about whether they’ll be able to rely upon employees.”

Child Care Aware estimates 9% of licensed child care programs have permanently closed since the pandemic began, based on its tally of nearly 16,000 shuttered centers and in-home day cares in 37 states between December 2019 and March 2021.

Now, each teacher resignation, coronavirus exposure and day care closure reveals an industry on the brink, with wide-reaching implications for an entire economy’s workforce.

The national crisis has forced many people — mostly women — to leave their jobs, reshaping the child care crisis as not just a problem for parents of young children, but also anyone who depends on them. It has contributed to a labor shortage, which in turn has hurt businesses and made it more difficult for customers to access goods and services.

“The decisions we make about the availability of child care today will shape the U.S. macroeconomy for decades to come by influencing who returns to work, what types of jobs parents take and the career path they are able to follow,” said Betsey Stevenson, an economist at the University of Michigan.

President Joe Biden has pledged an unprecedented burst of federal spending in hopes of fixing the child care market. At a recent town hall in Baltimore, he assured parents they would “not have to pay more than 7% of your income for child care.” Federal money would go directly to care centers to cover costs in excess of the 7% cap. This means the median U.S. family earning $86,372 would pay $6,046 annually for child care.

Biden’s plan also includes universal pre-kindergarten, which could further reduce child care expenses for families. The expanded monthly payments from the child tax credit approved in Biden’s $1.9 trillion coronavirus relief package would be extended for another year. The president also proposed increasing the size of a tax credit for the cost of child care, all of which should help improve access for families.

The Congressional Budget Office has yet to score the costs as the measures are still being negotiated ahead of Biden’s departure Thursday for the G-20 conference in Rome. But Donald Schneider, a former chief economist for the House Ways and Means Committee who now works for the consultancy Cornerstone Macro, estimates the child care and pre-kindergarten support would cost $465 billion over 10 years. The one-year price-tag of the expanded child tax credit would be around $120 billion. The credit would cost an additional $940 billion if renewed for nine more years.

It remains to be seen what survives in the brutal negotiations in Congress for Biden’s broad family services agenda, but the pandemic is proving to be a make-or-break catalyst for the future of the child care industry.

At Forever Young Daycare in the Seattle suburb of Mountlake Terrace, Amy McCoy is burning out fast.

She’s spent half of this year trying to hire a new assistant for her in-home child care, but until then, the former public school teacher works 50 hours a week caring for children herself, and more doing the cooking, cleaning and administrative work needed to run her business.

“At what point is my day care more important than my own family?” McCoy asked.

One of McCoy’s assistants, who worked there for five years, quit the $19-an-hour job in April for a $35-an-hour job nannying. McCoy has posted the opening for an entry-level assistant on Indeed and Facebook, offering $16 per hour — nearly 20% more than the state minimum wage. She’s gotten few responses and all turned her down over pay, making hiring impossible without a tuition increase.

“Nobody wants to work for what I can afford to pay right now,” McCoy said. “I absolutely believe these are $20-an-hour employees, but I hate that, most likely, I will have to raise tuition.”

The U.S. Treasury Department noted in a September report that child care workers earn on average $24,230. More than 15% of the industry’s workers live below the poverty line in 41 states and half need public assistance. The sector has high levels of turnover, with 26% to 40% leaving their job each year. Nor is there much room to give among child care centers that tend to operate on profits of 1% or less.

In nearby Edmonds, Briana McFadden shuttered her business, Cocoon Child Care Center, last month due to the stress of the pandemic, though McFadden thinks she would have stayed open if there were government subsidies to stabilize the industry.

In 12 years in business, McFadden said she never raised tuition and was the rare day care in the affluent northern Seattle suburbs to accept low-income families on a state subsidy. In pre-pandemic times, Cocoon employed seven people to care for 37 children. Now McFadden plans to open a convenience store.

“It really wasn’t worth it to continue,” McFadden said, her voice quivering with emotion. “Day care is a hard business.”

Tatum Russell’s livelihood depended as much on McFadden’s day care as the restaurant that employs her to hand-bread seafood.

During a COVID-19-related day care closure in August, the single mom could only stitch together help from relatives for some of the time. Russell ultimately had to miss four days of work.

“It’s been a nightmare, and it’s not over,” Russell said.

Find your latest news here at the Hemet & San Jacinto Chronicle

The post Exacerbated by pandemic, child care crisis hampers economy appeared first on The Hemet & San Jacinto Chronicle.