Capitol update for March 20, 2009

This week at the Capitol, little happened in terms of early childhood care and education legislation moving through the system. But that doesn’t mean that the week wasn’t crammed with happenings about early childhood!

Governor’s Supplemental Budget

To account for the growing budget deficit as announced earlier this month and the infusion of federal stimulus dollars into the state coffers, the Governor revised parts of his budget this week. The only change to early childhood is a delay in the CCAP rate cuts and copay increases to Oct. 1, 2010. (His previous budget had CCAP cuts beginning in July 2009.)

Voices for Children Day

Thursday was Voices for Children Day at the Capitol. Over 800 children, parents and providers showed up and raised their voices for children! Sarah Caruso, president of the Minnesota Children’s Museum and chair of the Governor's Early Childhood Advisory Council spoke, representatives from ECFE, Head Start, school-based programs and child care gave rallying speeches, and Rep. Sandy Peterson, Rep. Nora Slawik, and Speaker of the House Margaret Anderson Kelliher all spoke to the crowd. Thanks to all who attended, met with their legislators, and kept the issue in front of their legislators. We couldn’t have done it without you. Photos of the event will be posted at the Ready 4 K and Voices websites for photos from the event.

House Targets

Ready 4 K and our allies have been working very hard to ensure that early care and education is a top priority for legislators as they set their budget targets….and it paid off. Right on the heels of Voices for Children, the leadership of the House DFL (Speaker Kelliher and Majority Leader Tony Sertich) announced that education, including early childhood, would be spared from any cuts by the House. This is a tremendous victory given the daunting budget deficit, and is a recognition by legislators of the high return on investment the state gets when it invests in quality early learning.

In other happenings, we remain concerned about the use of unallocated funds in Basic Sliding Fee child care. This week, the Senate HHS Finance Committee proposed using a portion of the funds to fill a hole in the Minnesota Sex Offender Program. We will continue to work with committee chair Sen. Berglin to find a long-term solution to the distribution of the BSF funds.

Next week's schedule will be a bit hard to predict, with committees jamming their agendas as the first bill deadline approaches on Thursday. Hearings may be long, go in and out of recess often, and be announced at the last minute. If you are interested in a particular bill, check out the Ready 4 K bill tracker.