A few years ago, I had just about given up hope.
Every month for nearly two years after my youngest was born, I methodically confirmed my son’s spot on a child care center’s really lengthy waiting list in hopes that we’d inch to the front of the line. We’d chosen it because it was close to work and had a great reputation.
At one point, I think there were over 60 children in front of my son, and judging by how slowly the waitlist progressed, dozens of parents were doing the same thing every month.
During that time, our family had relied on a home care situation involving our parents because there were two-year wait lists for infant care at many Oklahoma City area centers.
It’s not nice to hope that people lose their jobs, face financial difficulties, or that families move. But thanks to the boondoggle that is our child care system that’s often what it takes in many parts of our state.
One family’s shattering misfortune results in another feeling like they’ve won the lottery, albeit an expensive one that results in a five-figure price tag.
I naively expected finding child care to be easy when I was pregnant with my daughter over seven years ago.
As I quickly learned, our male-dominated, Republican-run Legislature has done a phenomenal job ignoring a major challenge facing parents.
Because if there’s one thing that unifies Oklahoma’s working parents, it’s that we pretty much all have war stories from our quest to find quality and affordable child care.
So I wasn’t particularly surprised that a recent study published by United WE and Oklahoma State University found our child care system is broken.
What shocked me is how bad things have gotten thanks to the continued neglect in our Statehouse and the repeated decisions year-after-year to avoid tackling a difficult issue and an aversion to spending money to make it better.
The study found that:
- Over 55% of Oklahomans live in a child care desert. That means over 66% of children living in those counties — which include the populous Oklahoma, Tulsa and Cleveland counties — may lack child care access.
- While there are over 3,000 licensed child care facilities, Oklahoma has two children per available slot in over half of its counties.
- On average, there are 3.5 children for each child care slot. There is not a single Oklahoma county that has more child care slots than children who need them.
- In western Oklahoma’s Beaver County, there are nearly 20 children per slot, while in Cherokee County, there are nearly 18 children per slot, the study found.
- One Oklahoma Panhandle county — Cimarron — reported no licensed child care facilities. And over a dozen counties had five or fewer options.
That is horrible news for parents that need child care and for our state’s businesses that need a reliable workforce.
But perhaps that’s a key contributing factor as to why Republicans can’t land the types of business investments they want.
Thankfully the report’s authors seemed to be aware that our lawmakers are often like fish-out-water when it comes time to tackle some complex social issues that require money, knowledge and intestinal fortitude. They laid out some concrete suggestions to address this.
The report found Oklahoma’s Human Services department is responsible for a lot of the woes. Apparently the agency has staffing shortages and high turnover rates that “hinder all aspects of the licensing process.” They have lousy processes and communications.
Lawmakers, the report says, need to figure out how to reduce DHS turnover, perhaps by increasing pay and offering better working conditions. A streamlined licensing process that includes a step-by-step guide for new licensees along with a mentorship program would be useful. A staffed DHS help desk to expedite licensing would be helpful.
Our state, as turns out, is not doing a good job incentivizing new child care facilities to open, particularly in rural areas. They could do that through low-interest loans, grants or tax incentives.
Then there are the “overly burdensome” regulations. Lawmakers need to simplify regulatory requirements and ensure there’s flexibility in how providers can achieve educational guidelines.
And finally, there’s apparently massive variations “in municipal, city and county regulations for zoning, health and safety and licenses/permits.” Those are vastly different depending on where you live, but they’re making it difficult for entrepreneurs in some areas to open child care centers. Less local control could help solve that along with streamlining those processes.
This is not an easy issue to solve.
A lot of states are grappling with similar challenges, but we have to do something. The fact that this is an issue in 2024 is not OK.
We don’t live in a world where moms or dads must stay home with their kids anymore. Our society often requires two-parent incomes to afford the basic necessities like health care, housing and food.
And, we shouldn’t be forcing adults to choose between having children and a career.
But that’s exactly what lawmakers are doing right now by enabling a system that has limited child care options and by acting like our antiquated policies are all hunky dory.
Access to child care is freedom for parents to work. Children benefit from getting a head start on their education.
In any case, this is something we desperately need to fix and invest in if we want to have a healthy, vibrant society.
This report should be a wakeup call for those at our state Capitol.
Will lawmakers have the intestinal fortitude to do something or will they continue to shirk their responsibilities to families and children?
