The pandemic has shined a bright light on the importance of child care to local economies throughout the country. But, as LISC’s Cindy Larson points out in a new blog, it has long been a critical issue with regard to racial, gender and economic equity as well. A new LISC program, with support from Pivotal Ventures, is helping fuel innovation in child care facilities development to address significant gaps in service, building on decades of work to benefit families, providers and communities.
Can we begin to talk about child care as a critical issue of racial, gender and economic equality? The implications are clearer today than they ever have been.
Mounting COVID-19 losses are threatening to close half the child care providers across the country, eliminating thousands of vital jobs along with 4.5 million child care spots. These losses will hit low- and moderate-income families particularly hard, as they already struggle to find affordable care. And, they will have a disproportionate impact on woman—especially women of color—who make up the majority of child care operators and staff, and are more likely than men to have their careers disrupted when their families can’t find quality care within their means.
If we are to address these disparities, and the impact they have on local economies and the well-being of communities, we need to think differently about how we invest in child care facilities. While physical space is only one part of what’s needed to serve more families, it is essential and one that this long under-resourced industry has struggled with for decades. Space matters; it affects not only access to services but the health and well-being of children and teachers alike.
That’s why LISC is bringing together a range of new partners, programs and financial tools to help expand the universe of affordable child care and offer best practices for others to do the same. We are particularly excited about our new Building Innovation for Equitable Child Care program, which will fund predevelopment costs for community partners pursuing a “co-location” approach, incorporating high-quality, affordable child care facilities in an assortment of development projects.
The pilot program is seeded with a grant from Pivotal Ventures, an investment and incubation company created by Melinda Gates to advance social progress in the U.S., and we are seeking new funders and investors as well, so we can build our capacity to incubate co-location projects throughout the country.
In practice, this strategy might mean building a child care facility within a new affordable housing development, or connecting a new early learning center to a health center, or working with a neighborhood nonprofit to fuel small home-based child care providers. The goal is to help communities re-imagine child care as foundational to their social and economic health, and to pursue development strategies that reflect that value. A Building Innovation for Equitable Child Care toolkit will offer a roadmap for communities to operationalize their child care vision to meet the needs of local families.
These projects will help us better understand some of the historical barriers to development of child care facilities, and the lessons learned will help inform regulatory, funding and policy decisions that shake up old norms and fuel innovation and progress that might not otherwise be possible.
“The pandemic has made clear that if we want an economy that works for everyone we can’t treat child care as an afterthought,” said Jennifer Stybel, caregiving lead at Pivotal Ventures. “We need new ideas and fresh thinking to fix America’s broken caregiving system. Pivotal Ventures is excited to support LISC’s innovative approach to bring quality, affordable child care closer to the parents and businesses who depend on these services.”
LISC has long invested in child care facilities through statewide demonstration projects, small-business loans for providers and, most recently, even COVID-19 relief grants and Paycheck Protection Program (PPP) loans that have helped owners sustain operations and preserve jobs amid pandemic losses. This program expands on all of that to meet the moment we’re in today.
Community Development Financial Institutions (CDFIs) like LISC are well-suited to fuel this kind of effort. We can leverage our network of community-based partners to test new models and work with funders and investors to develop new funding streams—all focused on underserved communities, where conventional capital does not effectively reach a host of business owners and services providers.
For LISC, this is part of a larger effort to drive a more broadly shared prosperity throughout the country—including our Project 10X initiative to close the racial gaps in health, wealth and equity that impact millions of people.
And it is made more urgent by the ongoing impact of the pandemic. By investing in child care facilities, we can support frontline, essential workers—the local caregivers who do hero’s work every day. We can help drive jobs and local economies. And we can directly address questions of racial and gender equity—all while giving our youngest learners a strong start in life.
We firmly believe that this work is a social, economic and moral imperative. We are eager to collaborate with new partners to deepen its impact.
Cindy Larson, National Program Director for Child Care & Early Learning
Cindy has dedicated her career to supporting children, families and communities. She leads LISC’s strategic investments, advocacy and technical support focused on growing access to high quality child care opportunities and early learning environments nationwide. Cindy has more than 30 years of industry experience and brings a deep understanding of the complex intersections between child care and community development to her work and the mission of creating systemic change.