The current version of the state budget for fiscal year 2011-2012 cuts $535 million from Child Care and Development programs that, according to the Department of Education, serve almost 500,000 low-income children.
The proposed budget lowers the maximum age for childcare subsidies from 12 to 11— eliminating childcare funds for roughly 14,000 children—and lowering the maximum monthly income cut-off from $3,769 to $3,015. This amounts to terminating childcare eligibility for 14,000 to 16,000 families.
And the impact is not limited to childcare; K-12 program funding has been cut $100 per student from last year. This reduction, caused largely by the loss of federal stimulus money, is part of a continuing trend. According to the non-partisan Legislative Analyst’s Office, the proposed level of funding is a 6.4 percent decrease from 2007-2008 funding levels.
But the continued downward spiral of funding for education has a ripple effect that extends to programs not directly funded by state dollars.
Charlie Sciamma is a Community Organizer with PODER and a parent of three children. Two of them, Nicolo, 6, and Habbib, 4, are enrolled at Fairmount Elementary School.
“Because of the state of the budget, the money us parents and teachers make through grassroots fundraising like bake sales covers the kind of things the district used to pay for,” Sciamma said. “In the past that money was able to go towards programs parents wanted to create to supplement our kid’s education.”
Sciamma and his wife, nonprofit lawyer Laura Chiera, both work full time and until this year used the afterschool program at Fairmount Elementary for Nicolo. Sciamma said they experienced firsthand what can happen if afterschool programs become unavailable.
“School lets out at 2:40 p.m. and the last possible time you can pick your kids up from the afterschool program is at 6:00 p.m. (…) it was kind of a lifesaver for us. It gave us more flexibility in our work schedule,” he said. “But now Habbib is enrolled in the preschool program, and the afterschool program is only for K-5. It doesn’t make sense to only have one kid in.”
He added that his work schedule was flexible enough to accommodate the new situation, but said that “not all families have that possibility at their workplace, so that’s a real hardship.”
There are other places for kids to go after school in the Mission, like Jamestown Community Center, which offers a variety of programs including the “Si se puede” program geared towards K-2.
Executive Director of Jamestown, Claudia Jason, said that even though the center is not officially classified as a child development program and does not directly benefit from CDP funds, a reduction in funding to official programs could have a ripple effect.
“If more children are getting cut from other programs, the demand goes up for ours,” she said. “But you can’t get blood from a turnip, and we don’t have the ability to meet the demand. It might be that those families go without services.”
In addition, Jamestown does receive funding through the Department of Children, Youth and Families, which may be impacted by the final budget.
Luis Barahona, a community organizer with Jamestown, said the center can’t take on any more students because of dwindling resources.
“We want to serve more kids, but at the same time, not at the expense of quality,” said Barahona. “We could put 40 kids in a class, but then they aren’t really getting the attention they need to improve. Our one-on-one tutoring is literally one-on-one; one tutor with one student, the same tutor every time.”
He adds that if more cuts come down the pipe, it won’t be a case of things getting bad but worse.
“Any loss of money means we have to find a way to shore up our program. What happens is we end up losing tutors,” he said. “Last year we had 20 students in our youth apprenticeship program, and because of cuts last year, now we only have ten.”