Capitol Update April 24

This week at the Capitol, the two major activities to note are the passage of the House Omnibus Early Childhood bill, and the release of the Senate Omnibus Health and Human Services bill.



On Thursday, the House Omnibus Early Childhood Bill passed the full House on an 84-47 vote, largely the same as it left committee. Going forward, the child care articles will be conferenced with the Health and Human Services bill, and the early education articles with the Education bill. Expect those conference committees to begin next week.



Read the Pioneer Press article about the bill here.



Rumors were flying all week as to the release date of Sen. Berglin’s Omnibus Health and Human Services bill. It finally was released on Friday, and rejects most of the Governor’s cuts to child care. While the bill does use the unallocated funds in Basic Sliding Fee to help solve the budget deficit, it rejects harmful cuts to the integrity of child care assistance, specifically, it does not include the an increase in parent co-pays or a decrease in provider reimbursement rates. With regards to the federal stimulus dollars, the bill specifies that the quality set aside dollars must be used to continue the Family, Friend and Neighbor grant program, continue the Parent Aware quality rating system, and fund quality improvements to help providers get ready for the rating system. The remaining $22.6 million is used to buy down the increased caseload in MFIP child care. Going forward, we will continue to advocate for continuing the School Readiness Connection pilot.



Be sure to thank Sen. Berglin for her commitment to child care!



Check out our omnibus bill tracker, updated with the proposals included in the Senate Omnibus Health and Human Services bill.