Marin supervisors allot another $475K for child care

Marin County supervisors allocated another $475,000 on Tuesday to increase the availability of affordable child care, fulfilling a promise to spend $1 million in federal aid.

The supervisors pledged in June 2021 to use the American Rescue Plan Act grant money to support child care in Marin. In April, they allocated $525,000.

First 5 Marin, one of 58 county commissions that guide the spending of Proposition 10 tobacco tax funds on child care, is serving as the fiscal agent accepting the county’s money. However, the nonprofit Marin Child Care Council is overseeing the spending of the bulk of the money: $700,000 to fund a teacher investment and retention pilot program.

“We still have a huge shortage of teachers and that has really impacted the capacity of what we can serve in the county,” Aideen Gaidmore, director of the Marin Child Care Council, told supervisors. “Several of our state funded programs can’t take more kids at this time even though their contract would allow them because they can’t staff the rooms.”

Gaidmore said the biggest obstacle to attracting child care teachers is the low pay. She said most beginning teachers get paid between $18 and $20 an hour.

“A lot of low-income women of color do this work,” Gaidmore said.

To address this issue, the council has launched a teacher investment and retention pilot program that provides participants with a yearly $8,000 guaranteed minimum income. The program has 22 participants.

A survey of the participants found that they have used the additional pay for such things as rent, car repairs, summer camp for their own children and for additional education. Several of the participants are taking college classes to enhance their qualifications, even though it is not a requirement of the program.

In addition to the guaranteed minimum income, the program is also providing emotional support to participants. Gaidmore said that particularly because of the COVID-19 pandemic, teachers and the children they care for have endured a lot of stress in recent years.

“We have teachers who have their own trauma who are going into the classroom to deal with kids who are facing trauma,” Gaidmore said.

She said the council has hired a licensed psychotherapist to lead a monthly support group for the teachers “so they can go into the classroom and be more responsive to the children.”

The council is also using $50,000 of the money supplied by the county for a separate effort to recruit more family child care providers who are licensed to operate at their homes.

“Since COVID we’ve lost 12% of our family child care providers,” Gaidmore said.

She said family child care providers play a crucial role in providing care for infants and children whose parents work nontraditional hours, such as the night shift.

County Administrator Matthew Hymel said that while the county is making these one-time allocations to child care, “the Marin Community Foundation has funded a long-term working group effort to come up with long-term solutions for child care.”

In April 2022, Johnathan Logan, a vice president at the foundation, said his organization had committed to spending up to $500,000 on the effort.

Hymel told the supervisors, “We’ll be reporting back to your board on the results of that effort.”

First Five Marin is overseeing the spending of $250,000 of the money being supplied by the county. The bulk of that, $200,000, is funding a program that helps to identify children with developmental delays and to connect their families to the support they need.

Maria Patricia Niggle, First 5 Marin’s executive director, said she works with kindergarten readiness teams in Marin City and western Marin.

“They’re seeing developmental milestones getting missed,” Niggle said.

First 5 Marin is also spending $50,000 in county funds to provide early childhood mental health services.

During the public comment portion of the supervisors’ meeting, John Watson, a community organizer with the Marin Center for Independent Living, noted that his mother cares for his 19-month infant because he and his wife can’t find child care in Marin. He urged the county to redouble its efforts to support child care.

“Make it possible for parents like us to work,” Watson said, “and for our parents to be retired, the way my mom thought she was going to be right now.”