Child care providers, parents call on Oregon Legislature to support subsidy program
Victoria Mendoza stands behind a podium alongside child care providers and advocates during an event to call attention to the need to fund child care. The event was held in front of the Oregon State Capitol on Monday, May 12, 2025. (Mia Maldonado / Oregon Capital Chronicle)
Victoria Mendoza opened up a child care business in Salem 16 years ago — a decision inspired by her own need to find child care for her sons while maintaining a job.
With child care providers located too far from where she lived, the former farmworker and immigrant from Mexico obtained a license so she could care for her own children and others. Since then, she's successfully managed her small business and watched hundreds of children in Salem.
'My plan was to stop once my kids were grown, but I love kids. My house feels empty without children,' she told the Oregon Capital Chronicle.
But Mendoza, alongside many other Oregon child care providers, is bracing for the possibility of shutting down her business. With federal programs like Head Start facing potential cuts, child care providers like herself and low-income families are increasingly dependent on state support — particularly the Employment Related Day Care program.
The state of Oregon subsidizes child care costs through the Employment Related Day Care program, which is open to low-income households.
As of May, 16,300 Oregon families are enrolled, but another 11,300 remain on a waitlist, according to data from the Oregon Department of Early Learning and Care. Another 4,200 families have been approved for financial support, but cannot find an eligible child care provider.
This is largely because there are not enough child care providers in Oregon. A 2023 report from the state's Early Learning Division program found that nearly all of Oregon's counties are child care deserts, with one slot for every three children who need care. Without access to child care, parents like Mendoza are faced with limited options to give up their jobs or find other ways to manage child care.
Mendoza, alongside advocates with Family Forward Oregon, a nonprofit dedicated to advocating for child care support, called on the Oregon Legislature on Monday in front of the state capitol to pass four bills to support child care providers and low-income families.
These bills include:
Senate Bill 5514: $225 million to the Employee Related Day Care program,
House Bill 2452: $9 million to strengthen Oregon's child care referral system,
House Bill 3008: $15.4 million for child care workers to stay in and enter the profession
House Bill 2593: Creates a workgroup to develop recommendations to improve Oregon's day care program and eventually end the waitlist for the program.
Sen. Courtney Neron Misslin, D-Wilsonville, spoke in favor of the legislation. The educator and mother said she understands the struggles her constituents face trying to find child care.
Thousands of Oregon, Washington children at risk if Head Start ends, lawsuit alleges
'The Trump administration is proposing devastating cuts to Head Start, SNAP and Medicaid funding,' she said. 'We must be ready. Oregon must act now to protect child care investments and ensure a stronger economy and a more resilient economy. Our state's role in improving access to high quality and affordable care is more important than ever.'
Candice Vickers, executive director of Family Forward Oregon, said 20% of Oregon's child care workforce is run by immigrant women, and up to half of Oregon's child care workers are on Medicaid.
'We need that $225 million,' she told the Capital Chronicle. 'We know that it's a lot, and people see it as a competing interest, but — again you can see like Medicaid and the immigrant workforce — all of these issues are interconnected.'
For Mendoza, state investment won't just save her business, but it will allow her to keep supporting local families in her community.
'When we support child care providers, we are also supporting families,' Mendoza said.
SUBSCRIBE: GET THE MORNING HEADLINES DELIVERED TO YOUR INBOX
Hashtags
Try Our AI Features
Explore what Daily8 AI can do for you:
Comments
No comments yet...
Related Articles
Yahoo
an hour ago
- Yahoo
Why everyone from Musk to Wall Street is worried about U.S. debt payments
The Republicans' "big beautiful" budget package is uniting everyone from Elon Musk to Wall Street over an issue that experts say could pose a threat to the nation's long-term fiscal stability: The rising cost of servicing the U.S. government's growing mountain of debt. The U.S. spent $1.1 trillion in interest on its debt in 2024 — almost double the amount it was paying five years ago, according to Federal Reserve Bank of St. Louis data. The nation now spends more on interest payments than it does on defense, data from the Stockholm International Peace Research Institute shows. Those costs could rise even more under the Republican tax and spending bill now being considered in the Senate, according to a June 5 analysis by the Congressional Budget Office. The version of the tax bill passed by the House last month is projected to increase the federal deficit — the gap between what the federal government spends each year and what it collects in revenue — by $2.4 trillion over the next decade, the nonpartisan agency found. That would require the government to raise additional debt, resulting in additional interest payments of about $550 billion over the next decade, the CBO forecasts. By 2035, interest on the nation's debt could reach $1.8 trillion, according to the Committee for a Responsible Federal Budget, a nonpartisan think tank focused on fiscal issues. "The interest costs now are bigger than defense spending, which is an extraordinary," Chris Edwards, an expert on federal tax issues at the Cato Institute, a libertarian-leaning think tank, told CBS MoneyWatch. "The budget threat here is that all of these increasing federal interest costs will crowd out all the other priorities in the federal budget that the policymakers want to spend on." In other words, the federal government could struggle to support vital programs like Social Security as a larger share of its budget is eaten up by interest payments on the nation's swelling debt. Federal interest payments as a share of the nation's gross domestic product stood at 3% last year, according to Federal Reserve Bank of St. Louis data. If current trends holds, that could rise to 4.1% of GDP by 2035, the nonpartisan Peter G. Peterson Foundation estimates. !function(){"use strict"; 0!== e= t in r,i=0;r=e[i];i++)if( d= Democrats have pointed to analyses showing the bill's tax cuts will benefit wealthier Americans far more than low- and middle-income workers while also adding to the national debt. "No single piece of legislation in my time here in Congress will do more to add to the national debt than this one," Rep. Brendan Boyle, a Democrat from Pennsylvania who voted against the legislation, said last month on the House floor. Many Republicans, however, point to the bill's proposed tax cuts as providing an avenue for economic growth. "We are going to celebrate a new golden age in America," House Speaker Mike Johnson said last month after the bill passed in the House. Concerns from Elon Musk, Wall Street The cost of paying for the nation's debt has drawn concern from many corners, including Tesla CEO Elon Musk, who earlier this month posted about it on social media as he voiced his objections to the GOP bill. "Congress is spending America into bankruptcy!" Musk posted on June 5, pointing to data showing that interest payments have risen from $416 billion in 2014 to more than $1 trillion in 2024. Moody's Ratings downgraded U.S. credit last month, citing among its reasons the mounting concerns about the nation's increasing debt load and interest payments. "Successive U.S. administrations and Congress have failed to agree on measures to reverse the trend of large annual fiscal deficits and growing interest costs," the credit rating agency said. "Over the next decade, we expect larger deficits as entitlement spending rises while government revenue remains broadly flat." Moody's added, "In turn, persistent, large fiscal deficits will drive the government's debt and interest burden higher." On June 7, the White House said in a memo that the GOP tax bill "significantly improves our nation's fiscal trajectory by including $1.7 trillion in mandatory savings," while President Trump's tax cuts will spur economic growth. Some economic forecasters project that Mr. Trump's tariffs will drag down U.S. growth. The nation's growth could slide to 1.6% in 2025 and 1.5% next year partly because of those import levies, a sharp reduction from the 2.8% growth recorded last year, the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development said last week. How did interest payments get so big? In recent years, interest payments on the federal debt have ballooned for two main reasons. First, a series of COVID-related spending bills provided $4.6 trillion to individuals and businesses to help them keep afloat during the pandemic, with much of that financed through new debt. Second, the Federal Reserve started hiking interest rates in March of 2022 to tame high inflation. But that also meant the Treasury Department needed to pay higher rates to bondholders, adding to the cost of servicing the nation's burgeoning debt. In 2020, the U.S. had about $27 trillion in outstanding debt, according to Treasury data. By 2024, that had jumped 32% to $35.5 trillion. Over that time, the Fed's benchmark interest rate rose from close to zero percent to a high of more than 5% in 2024. One reason the Republican budget bill is forecast to increase the deficit — and add to the nation's interest costs — is that it would extend President Trump's 2017 tax cuts, as well as add other breaks, such as eliminating taxes on worker tips and overtime pay. Altogether, those tax cuts will cost $3.75 trillion, the CBO estimates. The revenue loss would be partially offset by nearly $1.3 trillion in reduced federal spending elsewhere, namely through Medicaid and food assistance. But that still leaves a significant funding gap. In the meantime, the U.S. could face a financial strain in servicing its debt, especially in the face of an economic slowdown, experts have warned. "The most dangerous scenario is that the giant size of our debt precipitates a U.S., and even global, economic recession and financial crisis," Cato's Edwards told CBS MoneyWatch. "We saw this 15 or so years ago in Greece and some other European countries. That sort of crisis could be coming to the United States at some point, but no financial expert knows exactly when that's going to be." An accused woman skips her pedicure, kills her ex-husband LAPD chief speaks out about deployment of military forces to anti-ICE protests Sneak peek: The Day My Mother Vanished Error in retrieving data Sign in to access your portfolio Error in retrieving data Error in retrieving data Error in retrieving data Error in retrieving data
Yahoo
an hour ago
- Yahoo
By the numbers: Here are the changes proposed to the food stamp program
The Brief More than 3 million people could be cut from food stamp assistance if President Trump's spending bill is approved. A little over 42 million people receive food stamps in the U.S., or one out of every eight people. President Donald Trump's big, beautiful spending bill could mean billions of dollars in cuts for food stamps. The proposed changes to the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program, or SNAP, would make states pick up more of the costs, require several million more recipients to work or lose their benefits, and potentially reduce the amount of food aid people receive in the future. Those changes would likely cut 3.2 million people from the SNAP program, the Congressional Budget Office estimated. Here's what to know: RELATED: Senate Republicans plan to release revisions to Trump tax bill The backstory The federal aid program formerly known as food stamps was renamed the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program, or SNAP, on Oct. 1, 2008. The program provides monthly payments for food purchases to low-income residents generally earning less than $1,632 monthly for individuals, or $3,380 monthly for a household of four. Timeline The nation's first experiment with food stamps began in 1939. But the modern version of the program dates to 1979, when a change in federal law took effect eliminating a requirement that participants purchase food stamps. There currently is no cost to people participating in the program. RELATED: Trump's actions in Los Angeles spark debate over deportation funds in spending bill By the numbers A little over 42 million people nationwide received SNAP benefits in February, the latest month for which figures are available. That's roughly one out of every eight people in the country. Participation is down from a peak average of 47.6 million people during the 2013 federal fiscal year. Often, more than one person in a household is eligible for food aid. As of February, nearly 22.5 million households were enrolled in SNAP, receiving an average monthly household benefit of $353. The money can be spent on most groceries, but Trump's administration recently approved requests by six states — Arkansas, Idaho, Indiana, Iowa, Nebraska and Utah — to exclude certain items, such as soda or candy. Big picture view Legislation passed by the House is projected to cut about $295 billion of federal spending from SNAP over the next 10 years, according to the Congressional Budget Office. A little more than half of those federal savings would come by shifting costs to states, which administer SNAP. Nearly one-third of those savings would come by expanding a work requirement for some SNAP participants, which the CBO assumes would force some people off the rolls. Additional money would be saved by eliminating SNAP benefits for between 120,000 and 250,000 immigrants legally in the U.S. who are not citizens or lawful permanent residents. RELATED: Trump touts $1,000 'Trump accounts' for babies born in US Another provision in the legislation would cap the annual inflationary growth in food benefits. As a result, the CBO estimates that the average monthly food benefit would be about $15 lower than it otherwise would have been by 2034. Dig deeper To receive SNAP benefits, current law says adults ages 18 through 54 who are physically and mentally able and don't have dependents need to work, volunteer or participate in training programs for at least 80 hours a month. Those who don't are limited to just three months of benefits in a three-year period. The legislation that passed the House would expand work requirements to those ages 55 through 64. It also would extend work requirements to some parents without children younger than age 7. And it would limit the ability of states to waive work requirements in areas that lack sufficient jobs. Local perspective The federal government currently splits the administrative costs of SNAP with states but covers the full cost of food benefits. Under the legislation, states would have to cover three-fourths of the administrative costs. States also would have to pay a portion of the food benefits starting with the 2028 fiscal year. All states would be required to pay at least 5% of the food aid benefits, and could pay more depending on how often they make mistakes with people's payments. States that had payment error rates between 6-8% in the most recent federal fiscal year for which data is available would have to cover 15% of the food costs. States with error rates between 8-10% would have to cover 20% of the food benefits, and those with error rates greater than 10% would have to cover 25% of the food costs. Many states could get hit with higher costs. The national error rate stood at 11.7% in the 2023 fiscal year, and just three states — Idaho, South Dakota and Vermont — had error rates below 5%. But the 2023 figures likely would not serve as the base year, so the exact costs to states remains unclear. As a result of the cost shift, the CBO assumes that some states would reduce or eliminate benefits for people. What's next The legislation, which narrowly passed the U.S. House, could undergo further changes in the Senate, where it's currently being debated. Trump wants lawmakers to send the "One Big Beautiful Bill Act" to his desk by July 4, when the nation marks the 249th anniversary of the Declaration of Independence. The bill passed the House last month by a margin of just one vote — 215-214. A vote also could be close in the Senate, where Republicans hold 53 of the 100 seats. Democrats did not support the bill in the House and are unlikely to do so in the Senate. Some Republican senators have expressed reservations about proposed cuts to food aid and Medicaid, and the potential impact of the bill on the federal deficit. GOP Senate leaders may have to make some changes to the bill to ensure enough support to pass it. The Source This report includes information from The Associated Press.
Yahoo
an hour ago
- Yahoo
Thune threatens to nix July 4 recess to finish work on Trump's ‘big, beautiful bill'
Senate Majority Leader John Thune (R-S.D.) on Wednesday said he would keep senators in Washington during the July 4 recess week to complete work on the GOP's 'one big, beautiful bill' by the self-imposed deadline. When asked on Wednesday morning if the GOP would work through the recess if the bill is not passed beforehand, Thune answered in the affirmative. 'Yes,' he said. Republicans have remained bullish that they will be able to complete work on the massive piece of legislation by June 27, though the party still has to hit key checkpoints on the road to that goal. Senators are slated to be back in their home states from June 28 through July 6. Senate committees this week are rolling out key portions of the mammoth bill, with the Finance and Agriculture panels being among the most anticipated ones that remain unreleased. Those sections of the bill contain some of the most hotly contested issues that could stymie its progress. More pressing, though, is there still remain a number of holdouts on the bill — including Sens. Ron Johnson (R-Wis.), Lisa Murkowski (R-Alaska) and Susan Collins (R-Maine) — as the Senate GOP tries to nail down key items, including on spending cuts, Medicaid and renewable energy tax credits, among other items. Senate Republicans can afford to lose three votes on the final bill, with that total already at two as Sen. Rand Paul (R-Ky.) has made clear his opposition over the inclusion of a $4 trillion debt ceiling hike. After changes are completed in the upper chamber, the bill will need to head back to the House for final passage before it goes to the Resolute Desk for President Trump's signature. Copyright 2025 Nexstar Media, Inc. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed.
