As the last full month of summer, August is usually filled with vacations and back-to-school planning. This August, however, will also be 2019’s most crucial month for child care advocacy. Here’s why:
Last month, immediately before their August recess, Congress finally approved a deal to raise the spending caps through FY2021. Under this deal, non-defense discretionary funding—the budget category that funds a wide array of programs—will receive an increase of $56.2 billion over two years from FY2019 levels. This was an important first step for securing increased federal investments in child care and early learning programs such as CCDBG and Head Start.