Washington, D.C. – On Sept. 30, federal relief funding for child care expired. In recent years, several states expanded eligibility, improved affordability, and made other changes to their child care policies, funded in part by COVID-19 relief dollars.
See below for a statement from Susan Gale Perry, Chief Executive Officer at Child Care Aware of America.
The expiration of federal relief funding is officially here - and the good news is that the funding worked as intended to stabilize child care through the pandemic. But the work of making child care strong for everyone is far from finished.
Federal relief funding spurred many innovative state approaches to making child care more affordable and accessible for families and building and retaining a stable and well-trained workforce, and we need to keep building on that success.
We applaud the many states have stepped up and made historic investments in child care as relief funding ended, and urge all state and federal policymakers to prioritize child care funding in 2025 to build a stronger, more equitable child care system everyone.
