March 9, 2023

Allison Sayer - CRR Staff

At the February 21 Valdez City Council Meeting, council members approved the formation of a task force to address child care in the City of Valdez (COV). The goal of the task force will be to “create and submit...a strategic plan outlining short, middle and long-term actions recommended to address the child care crisis.”

The group will have the assistance of The Stellar Group, a consulting firm hired by COV, and administrative support from the COV Clerk’s Office.

The problem of access to childcare does not affect Valdez alone. State and nationwide, costs of child care exceed what many parents would earn at a job outside of the home, or there are shortfalls in availability at any cost. Our readers across the Copper Valley have extremely limited options.

The formation of the task force came in part at the urging of the volunteer group Valdez Zero to Three with Families Alliance. This group has been working on child care and early childhood education issues within Valdez since 2019. Most recently, they hosted a symposium on February 18 that included safety workshops and certifications for in-home child care providers and a panel on child care licensing requirements.

In a January 31 City Council work session, representatives of the Alliance stated a task force was needed because the problem was larger than a group of volunteers have the financial resources or technical expertise to overcome. Time is an issue as well, as many of those volunteers are engaged with the task of caring for very small children.

The task force’s specific assignments include taking inventory and making recommendations to build the physical, financial and human resources needed to create a stable, licensed childcare facility within Valdez.

The emphasis on licensed childcare comes in part from initial findings presented by The Stellar Group. After interviewing 126 families, the group found 74% of the families desired a licensed facility for their childcare needs.

The only licensed facility in Valdez, Stepping Stones, closed permanently in the summer of 2022 after a series of temporary closures. Former board president Brianne Skilbred shared in a phone conversation that the deciding factor in the permanent closure was the departure of the executive director. Licensed childcare facilities must have an administrator with specific credentials on-site at all times. Facility capacity is also tied to how many credentialed administrators they have.

Ideally, a facility would have multiple credentialed people beyond the minimum. If someone is the only one, they can not go to lunch, get sick, etc. without interrupting care.

The Stellar Group’s report stated that the “perception of difficulty” attaining the needed credentials was a barrier to some, but also emphasized there are resources available to help individuals attain those credentials.

About 40% of the Stellar Group respondents use unlicensed childcare providers. These providers are also a limited resource. Skilbred related that among her peers, finding child care is a function of “who you know and catching them fast enough. People get scooped up fast.”

Skilbred, who works full-time for COV and has two small children, related she feels fortunate to have a regular childcare provider while she and her husband are at work. She feels that her children are safe, happy, and loved with the care they receive, but that there are some shortcomings compared with a licensed daycare center.

Skilbred’s older daughter, now three, misses her friends from daycare. With unlicensed providers able to take a maximum of four children at a time, the social environment is more limited. Skilbred also wonders whether her younger child, still a baby, will learn the same pre-Kindergarten skills her older daughter did at daycare.

When Skilbred’s regular sitter is ill or otherwise unavailable, she has no backup. She shared that often she and her husband alternate taking half days off from their jobs in those situations. Skilbred expressed gratitude that both their employers are “understanding” and also empathy for others who are not in the same boat.

The Stellar Group survey reported respondents expressed anxiety around retaining their jobs due to absences that occurred when their childcare fell through. An additional 62% of respondents stated at least one member of the household was not working due to a lack of child care. Employers interviewed expressed they had lost staff due to this problem as well.

In addition to the lack of a credentialed childcare director, early childhood facilities have suffered from staffing issues across the board. Stepping Stones had issues in this area, sometimes forcing them to turn children away at the last minute.

According to the Stellar Group report, the staffing problem has been exacerbated by the lack of affordable housing in Valdez, which makes attracting and retaining staff in every industry difficult. Typical front-line childcare positions also do not offer benefits, which Skilbred said was a factor in Stepping Stones’ ability to attract staff.

Amanda Christine Wiese, a board member at the Valdez Co-op Preschool, said in a phone conversation that staffing issues have also forced the pre-school into closures without warning. This can form a feedback loop, lowering enrollment when parents and children have the negative experience of showing up to preschool only to find it is closed. With lower enrollment, there are fewer financial resources to keep the program going. A preschool is not meant to be a daycare; the hours are specific and limited. However, it is another part of the puzzle of early childhood care and education within the city.

Wiese herself, who is also a member of the Valdez Zero to Three with Families Alliance, said she is uncomfortable with the available childcare options in Valdez. She is a stay-at-home parent of three children and does not know when or if she will re-enter the workforce. Her education and experience are in fisheries biology.

Wiese added, “Our society is going to have to start valuing childcare and early education and supporting families and parents. It’s part of a larger problem.”

Is there any good news? One positive factor is that almost every significant entity in Valdez, and every member of the City Council, agrees this is a serious problem for families and employers. There also appears to be widespread awareness not only of the importance of child care to families but of the importance of early childhood education and, when needed, intervention.

Valdez City Schools Superintendent Tim Bauer also expressed in the January work session that building skills for Kindergarten readiness was not so technical that only licensed childcare facilities could do it.

Bauer emphasized that all childcare providers could help with “just a few minutes a day” of specific practices that could be easily learned. He offered Valdez City Schools’ expertise to help with this.

There are numerous state and federal programs that fund childcare and early education. Councilmember Olivia Foster, who is also part of the Zero to Three with Families Alliance, is on the board of Thread Alaska, an Anchorage-based organization that seeks to connect state child care organizations with federal funds.

The new task force has a deadline of September 30, 2023 to present their findings to the City Council. Group members will include one representative each from the Valdez Zero to Three with Families Alliance, the early childhood workforce, the city, Valdez City Schools, Providence Valdez, Prince William Sound College, Alyeska Pipeline Service Company, the Coast Guard, and the Valdez Native Tribe.

The full Stellar Group report is available in the backup materials for the January 31 work session on the COV website.

Disclosure: The City of Valdez is a Copper River Record advertiser.

Related links:

Stellar Group report on City of Valdez website

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