Proposed Budget a Mixed Bag for Young Children
RALEIGH—The budget released by the North Carolina General Assembly Wednesday evening provides early childhood programs with a reprieve from the damaging cuts of the past several years. At the same time, it keeps the state’s early education system disproportionately underfunded as compared to the K-12 system and higher education.
Key points:
- Smart Start: Pending two conditions, the state would invest $3.5 million in Smart Start for an early literacy program and assistance to ensure that children in rural communities have access to early childhood programs. The money could not be expended before January 1, 2013, and the money cannot be needed for Medicaid. However, Medicaid is typically in the red, making it unlikely that Smart Start would receive this funding.
- Child Care Subsidy: The state would decrease its investment in child care subsidy, replacing $7 million of state funds with federal funds. Overall, the funding for child care subsidy remains flat. Therefore, many low-income, working families will remain on waiting lists to receive assistance in affording child care.
- NC Pre-K: There is no additional money for NC Pre-K. The program will continue to have waiting lists of at-risk children. The state would no longer require a parent co-payment, and parents would have the ability to opt-out of the state’s nutrition assistance.
Statement by Dr. Olson Huff, Board Chair of The North Carolina Partnership for Children, Inc.
“Early education is an issue that military leaders have called a matter of urgent national security, economists have called critical to America’s competitive future, law enforcement officials have called a key tool in reducing crime, and educators have called vital to academic success. Frankly, until we have a budget with investments in early education that match the urgency inherent in those statements, we cannot rest.”
