Illinois businesses are advocating for more funding for child care assistance as facilities close while demand for services remains high.
ReadyNation Illinois, a nonprofit representing Illinois business leaders, reported Tuesday that Illinois is losing $6.2 billion each year because of the child care crisis. Parents are not able to be productive workers because they have to take care of their child instead, according to the report.
Bloomington-Normal has recently seen childcare facility closures even though demand is still high.
The cost of running a child care facility has also increased, leading to increased prices for parents and making some places unaffordable for some families.
Kayla Edwards, managing partner of Express Employment Professionals of Springfield, Bloomington and Jacksonville and member of ReadyNation Illinois, said without childcare, families struggle with being fully present at work as they continue to raise their kids.
“It's when workers are present, but not fully engaged in their work,” Kayla said. “But in this case of either presenteeism or absenteeism, employee productivity drops. Many parents reported being penalized due to child care problems.”
Edwards said presenteeism or absenteeism can lead to reduced hours, pay cuts or being fired as families try to provide for their child.
Tiffani Saunders, a parent from the village of Chatham just south of Springfield, said her child was on the wait list for multiple child care facilities in the area and she would not hear back from them for weeks. Saunders said her daughter is diagnosed with level three autism [the most severe designation], which not all child care facilities are equipped to handle.
“I lost count of how many I called, and [my daughter] never rose to the top of the list for most. She sat on one wait list for over a year before getting in and her tenure there lasted less than a year,” Saunders said.
Saunders said this restarted her search and now she had to spend more time making phone calls between different programs like Early Intervention and Child Care which is run by the Illinois Department of Human Services.
“We treat early intervention and child care as separate systems, and in many ways, they are,” Saunders said. “However, we as parents experience them as part of the same continuum, and often need access to both simultaneously.”
Saunders said she eventually had to hire a nanny because she could not find a childcare facility that would take her daughter. She added that being a salaried employee allowed her to be more flexible but not every family has that flexibility.
Sean Noble, co-director of ReadyNation Illinois, said the organization supports Gov. JB Pritzker’s proposal of a $55 million increase to the child care budget.
“We need to be able to support the people, the staff, the teachers that are necessary for child care and preschool programs, and make that really a viable option for employment for them,” Noble said.
Noble said they want to see continued investments into early childhood because it will support families as they balance raising kids and being productive workers.
ReadyNation Illinois said they will also be working on the federal level to get more government funding for child care.
Illinois is currently suing the federal government to unfreeze childcare funding.
