Latest news with #SB189
Yahoo
07-03-2025
- Politics
- Yahoo
Utah won't expand child care access this year
Children work with a staff member at Stepping Stones Tooele, a day care that shares a campus with Harris Housing and Switchpoint Tooele Community Resource Center in Tooele on Friday, May 24, 2024. (Photo by Spenser Heaps for Utah News Dispatch) A bipartisan effort to retrofit old, unused state buildings into child care facilities that would enter into public-private partnerships with child care businesses died on the House floor in a 22-48 vote Thursday after intense debate between lawmakers. It's the second year in a row that Utah, which places high value on families, voted down a Child Care Capacity Expansion Act. SB189 was recommended as a solution to the child care crisis in Utah from the Women in the Economy Subcommittee under the Governor's Office of Economic Opportunity. The subcommittee also conducted studies that concluded an estimated 75% of mothers with school-age children work, and that 74% of two-parent households with children under age 6 in Utah needed two incomes to cover household expenses. Sen. Luz Escamilla, D-Salt Lake City, the bill sponsor, ran a similar bill last year that died in the House due to fiscal concerns. Rep. Nicholeen Peck, R-Tooele, opposed the bill, saying she didn't think it was the government's responsibility to facilitate day care centers for the community, and adding that the phrase 'child care crisis' does not mean the same thing as it does in a third-world country, like Kenya, where 'there's a mom, in a hut, who drugs her children so that she can go out and work for a few hours to make enough money to get a bowl of rice, because there's literally no one around safe.' 'We might inadvertently be pulling children away from home-based child care, which actually gives them environments closer to their home environment, which is better for them socially and developmentally,' Peck said. Rep. Angela Romero, D-Salt Lake City, said many women in Utah don't choose to work, but have to. 'I just hate to compare us to another country when we live in the United States of America, and we are this family state that we claim to be here in Utah, but yet we don't want to provide a private-public partnership to ensure that our children are safe,' Romero said. 'I find that problematic.' Other critics of the bill said the state should be selling unused buildings. 'We should be selling them off or utilizing them for state-owned purposes,' Rep. Mark Strong, R-Bluffdale, said. 'We shouldn't be in the business of private child care.' Rep. Anthony Loubet, R-Kearns, said he had spoken to representatives of Utah's Division of Facilities Construction and Management, who, according to him, said they were concerned about the cost of retrofitting a building proposed for the project, and instead of the $2 million estimated cost to remodel the building, it would be $2.7 million. 'With us being very careful with how much money we're doing this year, I'm cautious about supporting the bill,' Loubet said. Rep. Christine Watkins, R-Price, said Utah needs to provide help to families. 'If you've never been in a situation where you have no place to take your children, it's awful,' Watkins said. 'I've been there, and we have many, many smart, strong, hard-working women who would like to go to work, but they don't have a place to take their children.' SUPPORT: YOU MAKE OUR WORK POSSIBLE
Yahoo
21-02-2025
- Business
- Yahoo
Utah lawmaker renews push for expanded child care access
A bill from Senate Minority Leader Luz Escamilla, D-Salt Lake City, would identify obsolete state-owned buildings and state-owned property that could be turned into child care facilities. (Getty Images) Utah, which has been dubbed a 'child care' desert for its shortage of care options, could soon provide retrofitted state facilities for expanded child care services in a new pilot program. A bill from Senate Minority Leader Luz Escamilla, D-Salt Lake City, would create the Child Care Capacity Expansion Act. The Division of Facilities Construction and Management would be tasked with identifying obsolete state-owned buildings and state-owned property that could be turned into child care facilities. With the newly retrofitted or constructed buildings, Utah would enter into a public-private partnership with child care operators. 'We're not in the business of child care centers and running them,' Escamilla said. 'It will be them (running the centers), but we will give them the lease, at no cost, so that will be the investment of the state.' SB189 also stipulates that 40% of the capacity of a child care center would be reserved for children of state employees, National Guard members, military and low-income communities in the surrounding area. The bill passed the Senate in Wednesday and is waiting for introduction in the House. A similar bill from Escamilla passed unanimously through the Senate during last year's session but failed to get House approval due to worries about practicality and a fiscal note of $5 million. In a Senate debate Wednesday, Escamilla said she and others in the Women in the Economy Subcommittee under the Governor's Office of Economic Opportunity have been working on the bill for a year and a half and have conducted studies to determine strategies to alleviate the 'child care crisis.' In Utah, an estimated 75% of mothers with school-age children work, according to the study done by the Women in the Economy Subcommittee. The study also found that 74% of two-parent households with children under age 6 in Utah needed two incomes to cover household expenses. 'It's a very small number of facilities that we can use, and we're just trying to find many ways of being creative when it comes to helping with child care and our working families that are right now struggling with their finances,' Escamilla said. Sen. Brady Brammer, R-Pleasant Grove, said while he does want child care options, there are already hundreds of privately owned and operated facilities in the state. 'I do have some concern with taking state-owned buildings that we otherwise may sell off assets that we no longer need or use for other purposes, and then retrofitting them so that we have a long-term obligation to keep a business in place at a subsidized rate, because we have now provided a facility, and we have provided the retrofitting cost for that facility to do what is otherwise a private endeavor,' he said. 'And I worry about this being an improper role of government.' Escamilla said that with this 'small pilot program,' two concerns are being addressed: access to child care and cost containment. 'We have a problem with child care,' she said. 'What I was told very clearly in this legislature is that we will not do direct subsidies, that the state was not going to invest in direct subsidies, so we have to find creative solutions.' SUPPORT: YOU MAKE OUR WORK POSSIBLE
Yahoo
05-02-2025
- Business
- Yahoo
Watering Utah's child care ‘deserts'
Child care in Utah is getting a break this year — and it's coming from both sides of the political spectrum. Republicans have advanced a bill incentivizing employers to offer child care, while Democrats have advanced a bill multiplying the number of child care centers throughout the state. Whether either or both bills are passed, many statistics say that such a bill is a long time coming. In 2024, a Bankrate study found that 75% of Utah exists in a child care 'desert,' where there are not enough day cares to serve the population. The U.S. Chamber of Commerce also estimated that child care issues create around a $1.36 billion loss for Utahns every year. Here's a look at the two new bills due for debate in the Utah Legislature. HB389 is sponsored by House Majority Whip Karen Lisonbee, R-Clearfield, while SB189 is headed by Senate Minority Leader Luz Escamilla, D-Salt Lake City. Together, the two women co-chair the Legislature's Women and the Economy Subcommittee. These bills have been under bipartisan and bicameral discussion for three years and support one another, rather than compete, the sponsors say. Republican-headed HB389 expands child care access by providing tax credits for corporate and individual employers who provide childc are for their employees. The legislation, which would take effect Jan. 1, 2026, if approved by both Utah's House and Senate, offers: A 20% tax credit for employers who contract with outside day cares. A 50% tax credit for employers who run their own child care. The higher tax credit for in-house child care reflects the lack of adequate child care facilities already available to most Utahns. HB389 represents a free-market approach to Utah's child care needs — an industry already struggling in a state where families have historically relied less on child care outside the home, according to 2023 research from Utah State University. Though the number of Utah moms who work falls below the national average, this is trending to change. Two-thirds of Utah moms with children under age 18 work, but more would if they could find high-quality, affordable child care. Nevertheless, as the Deseret News previously reported, many Utah employers resist building child care centers out of cost and maintenance concerns. 'I discovered a couple of years ago in Utah that businesses were staying away from the topic — didn't even want to talk about it — because they figured it was all or nothing: 'I'd have to build a child care center.' But there are so many things in between,' said Susan R. Madsen, a professor and child care researcher with the Utah Women & Leadership Project at Utah State University. HB389 could be one of these in-between options — making it more profitable for businesses to contract with child care centers or build their own. Lisonbee has discussed her bill with multiple employers already, but said she could not publicly disclose the names of those employers at this time. Sen. Escamilla's Child Care Capacity Expansion Act wants to address child care shortages with unused state buildings. The program, which, if passed, would launch on May 7, would: Retrofit obsolete state-owned buildings as child care facilities, which could then be leased at no cost to qualifying employers. Cover maintenance and utility costs with state funds. Require that 40 percent of child care spots be reserved for local community members. Provide discounts to low-income families. As the Deseret News previously reported, Escamilla advanced a near-identical bill in last year's legislature session. Her bill came in response to a loss amounting to hundreds of millions of dollars in federal child care funds. Escamilla's 2024 proposal carried a $5 million price tag and centered on empty offices in six state buildings in Salt Lake County. Gov. Spencer Cox endorsed her proposal by including it in his 2024 budget, per media reports. The bill successfully passed Republican scrutiny in the Utah Senate before dying in the House with little explanation. '(That) is the nature of the beast here... So we're back. I mean, I'm a Democrat, so I'm used to coming back,' Escamilla said. '(But) I think it's good policy and it's a good way to invest in infrastructure.' Escamilla still recognizes a dramatic gap in Utahns' child care needs and resources available to them. 'Utah is facing one of the worst child care crises in the nation, and we need your support,' she shared in a recent post to Instagram. Other child care-related bills this session include: HB207 'Sexual Offense Revisions' (Rep. Stephen Whyte, R-Mapleton): This bill expands the definition of sexual exploitation of children and strengthens sentences against offenders. HB365 'Mental Health Care Study Amendments' (Rep. Stewart Barlow, R-Fruit Heights): This bill requires that the University of Utah conducts a study on barriers preventing children from seeing therapists. HB413 'Child Custody Proceedings Amendments' (Rep. Mike Kohler, R-Midway): This bill specifies that caseworkers can't take action on child custody situations based on the actions of parents and that courts can't adjust child custody arrangements based on certain actions by their parents. SB173 'School Meal Amendments' (Sen. Luz Escamilla, D-Salt Lake City): This bill creates a free meals program for all public-school students. SB221 'Child Care Revisions' (Sen. Luz Escamilla, D-Salt Lake City): This bill requires licensing and certification for child care providers and restricts the number of children that one provider may take care of at a time.
