New York City Comptroller William C. Thompson Jr. today joined with City Councilmembers Bill de Blasio and David Weprin and child care advocates to oppose City Hall’s plan to slash 3,000 child care vouchers from the Administration for Children’s Services (ACS) budget.
“At a time when we many families across this city, our neighbors and friends, are struggling against formidable economic odds, this cut defies logic because these vouchers were designed to help those most in need,” Thompson said. “Families take part in this voucher program because they want to know their children are being cared for when they go out to look for work and to earn a living.”
Thompson fired off letters to the Mayor and City Council Speaker, demanding that they restore funding for this vital program in the Fiscal Year 2010 budget, which is on the cusp of approval. Joining Thompson at a news conference today in opposition to the plan were Councilmembers de Blasio and David Weprin and advocates.
“This budget leaves out thousands of children and their families,” de Blasio said. “Voucher programs provide children with the educational environment they need and parents with a vital resource they depend on. Turning our backs on these families now when times are tough will undermine their future and the future of their children.”
“This is the worst time to hurt families who most need this program,” added Weprin, Chair of the City Council Finance Committee. “Parents have enough to worry about, and child care should be the least of their worries. Going through with these cuts would create a hardship for children and families across this City.”
ACS provides various types of child care, including care in group centers and in homes. For families who meet required income limits, the agency allocates child care according to a priority code system. There are nine priority codes, with code 1 being the highest priority. Some child care is directly funded by ACS through contracts, while other child care providers operate independently of ACS. If a family eligible for ACS child care chooses to use an independent provider, ACS may issue a voucher to the family to defray the cost.
The plan is to completely eliminate child care vouchers in the lowest priority codes, 7, 8 and 9. Code 7 vouchers, which cover children whose families, though income-eligible, are not involved with ACS but rather are referred by community-based social service agencies.
The Mayor’s Preliminary budget reduced the number of code 7 vouchers by 860, and his Executive Budget calls for an additional reduction of 1,140 vouchers in this category, bringing the total reduction of code 7 vouchers to 2,000.
Additionally, City Hall plans to eliminate 1,000 vouchers for codes 8 and 9, those involving children whose parents are ill or incapacitated, and children whose parents are looking for work.
ACS has notified the City Council that children of parents who will no longer be eligible for these vouchers can seek center-based care in ACS-funded child care centers. It is unclear; however, how many slots are available at such centers.
(YWN Desk – NYC)
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5 Responses
Finally somebody has the guts to stand up against Bully Bloomberg. Our community must seriously re-examine our political realities both in NYC and in Albany.Seems to me, its time for a major shakeup and we are just the ones to do it. Let us take back our elected offices and hold these officials accountable-or else!
Askan:
In order to balance a budget, you must make concessions somewhere. What do you recommend they cut back on? Nursing home care? Mental health services? Emergency services? Or, should he raise taxes another 6% to make up the shortfall?
The cuts have to take place from some program. If you think OBJECTIVELY, this is the place to cut from.
artchill: maybe they should make cuts in abortion clinics or maybe in art schools, or maybe they shouldn’t spend millions of dollars putting up ugly faux looking waterfalls along the east river!!!
finally, i think the entire jewish community from new york city should go down to the board of ed, register their boys and girls into the public school system, it will cost them about 12,000 dollars a child, they will have to empty the buildings in your neighborhood, stop the bussing children from other neighborhoods into ours in order to make room for our children and then in september, noone will show up. they will have hired thousands of teachers to accomodate our children, and they will realize that the measly million it cost them to run this day care program is nothing compared to what it would have cost them to educate our children.
i think it’s a plan, we have nothing to lose and everything to gain.
artchill,
objectivly we are paying for a public school education that we do not receive. Our community is short changed and under served to the tune of hundreds of millions of dollars in education dollars. School bussing and computer hardware and books do not make up for the glaring overwhelming fact that our Yeshiva parents are tax paying citizens who are being shortchanged well after these pathetic 2000 vouchers. We are talking about a multiple billion doller budget that provides a mere pittance to our Yeshiva school families.Repeat after me- We are getting stiffed and Bloomberg knows it!!! But we are off point. This money is not for schooling its for the after school programs run by ACS to keep children from vulnerable families Jew and Non Jew alike from more serious trouble.(remember Nixmary Brown)Our community has utilized it because the City offers our community so little in educational services that we must maximize whatever programs are available to us.These program cuts will only hurt the most needy.Is this the kind of world we live in now? If you say yes then Bloomberg is your man and long live the rich because the poor and middle class are in for a bad time. We can and must do better.
Are you serious when you say of all places -this is the place to cut? Artchill, please be objective not ridiculous.
these programs should be cut to the bone. the TAXPAYERs are usually inelligible to benefit anyway. Cut most social programs and people should get paying jobs.