NOTE: As provided in LFC policy, this report is intended for use by the standing finance committees of the legislature.  The Legislative Finance Committee does not assume responsibility for the accuracy of the information in this report when used in any other situation.

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SOURCES OF INFORMATION

LFC Files

SUMMARY

Synopsis of Bill

A memorial resolving that the Children, Youth and Families Department (CYFD) use $500.0 from the federal child care block grant to provide quality initiatives to child care providers located outside of a metropolitan statistical area.

Significant Issues

Child care providers in rural areas do not have the same access to resources and receive substantially lower reimbursement than their counterparts in metropolitan areas. 45 CFR Parts 98 and 99 provides for using federal funds for quality child care initiatives. These are defined as initiatives to "improve child care by providing training in health and safety, nutrition, first aid, the recognition of communicable diseases, child abuse detection and prevention" and "care of children with special needs, and improving compensation for full-and part-time staff."

FISCAL IMPLICATIONS

The memorial requests CYFD use $500.0 from the federal child care block grant to fund the proposed rural child care quality initiative. If implemented this would become a recurring cost to the child care block grant.

ADMINISTRATIVE IMPLICATIONS

CYFD will have assess rural child care needs and develop a program to target the areas needing the most improvement. This will require consultation with rural child care providers throughout the state.

RELATIONSHIP

This memorial is related to HB 538 and SB 488.

GAC/njw