Significant federal funding is on the way head start Education centers are in crisis due to the government shutdown, but it could be a while before some children who rely on federal programs return to preschool.
Some centers that missed federal payments had to furlough staff. others had to completely shut downdestabilizing thousands of poor families across the country. Operators are also concerned that overdue payments could take several more weeks to process.
Even if the agency receives long-delayed grants, centers will have to rehire staff and bring back families, both of whom may be wary of the instability of a program that relies almost entirely on federal grants.
“The damage is being done in many ways,” said Michelle Hymowitz, executive director of the Massachusetts Head Start Association. “I know it will take some time to refuel.”
About 140 Head Start programs During the 43-day shutdown caused by President Donald Trump’s inauguration, 65,000 slots worth of annual subsidies were not received. signed a government funding bill Wednesday night.
Head Start serves children from birth to age 5 from low-income families. The program provides families with a variety of services, including early learning, support for children with disabilities, free meals, and health screenings.
Emily Hilliard, a spokeswoman for the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, which oversees the program, said that now that the government shutdown has ended, the federal Office of Head Start will expedite funding and will contact affected Head Start programs to share when they can expect to receive federal funding.
Head Start operators expect that could take several weeks.
Hymowitz said federal workers are back to “a ton of work” that takes time to process. This doesn’t just include shipping grants that weren’t awarded. Other documentation on various technical issues has since been delayed. Head Start Office Reductions she said earlier this year.
“These delays have been accumulating since April and are not the fault of existing civil servants in the Office of the Chief of Staff,” Hymowitz said. “We’re only at half the production capacity compared to just a few months ago.”
Family prepares for worst-case scenario
Depending on how quickly federal workers are able to transfer funds, the backlog in grant renewals could spill over and affect Head Start institutions scheduled to receive funds in December, administrators said. Some families attending these centers are already preparing for the worst-case scenario.
Gina Storer, who works as a home health aide in Xenia, Ohio, is trying to “make as much money as possible” in case her daughter’s Head Start center closes. Storer said staff at the center told parents hours before the government reopened that the center would likely close temporarily on Dec. 1 if funding was delayed.
If the center closes, Storer’s 4-year-old daughter Zarina will stay at home until it reopens. Stoller then has to adjust his work hours so he can go home with Zarina while his fiancée works 12-hour shifts at a Target distribution center.
uncertainty about SNAP federal food assistance payments The stress on Storer’s family also increased. Storer worked extra hours during the shutdown to support her 72-year-old mother, who also uses SNAP benefits.
“What would I do if my mom couldn’t help us?” the 31-year-old said.
For Storer, Head Start was more than a reliable option for child care. Zarina was undergoing speech therapy to correct her inability to speak. But since she started Head Start in September, Storer said she has noticed that her daughter has become more talkative and outgoing as she learns from conversations with her classmates.
Program pays out-of-pocket costs to keep doors open
Programs that continue without guaranteed federal reimbursement may also face additional financial burdens. At Lewis Russ’ home day care in Knox County, Indiana, he and his wife plan to open a pop-up toy shop in their garage to make up for the money they might lose by staying open.
Russ and his wife began operating a day care out of their home in April and soon partnered with the East Coast Migrant Head Start Project, a nonprofit that serves children of migrant farm workers across 10 states. Six of the eight children in Russ’ home day care receive funding from Head Start.
The East Coast Immigrant Head Start Project was one of the programs affected by the lack of funding, which resulted in more than 1,000 children being locked out of the center. Russ and his wife also stopped paying Head Start at the end of October, but the decision to keep their home open was “a no-brainer,” Russ said. He said it was important for the kids to provide consistency during an unpredictable time.
“That was the easy part, staying open and continuing to embrace the kids we have,” he said. “The hard part is figuring out how to stay open if this goes on too long.”
It’s stressful to run a program without knowing when funds will be released. Russ and his wife have already taken pay cuts and have another employee on their payroll. Russ said about three-quarters of the budget is staff, but other expenses such as groceries and maintenance can add up quickly without income.
“Our program was very new and we were running pretty much bare bones,” Russ said. “Especially in the childcare industry, where profit margins are not very high, there is little room for adjustment when something like this happens.”
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