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The latest on the Key Bridge collapse, New York puts forth legislation to get clean energy projects on the grid and Wisconsin and other states join a federal summer food program to help feed kids across the country.

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Republicans float conspiracy theories on the collapse of Baltimore's Key Bridge, South Carolina's congressional elections will use a map ruled unconstitutional, and the Senate schedules an impeachment trial for Homeland Secretary Mayorkas.

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Historic wildfires could create housing and health issues for rural Texans, a Kentucky program helps prison parolees start a new life, and descendants of Nicodemus, Kansas celebrate the Black settlers who journeyed across the 1870s plains seeking self-governance.

Access Wanting in Bay State Pre-K

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Thursday, May 12, 2016   

BOSTON – Wading through the paperwork involved in getting government help to pay for child care can be overwhelming to already overworked parents.

Now a new report by the Center for American Progress looks at how difficult it can be for low-income families to navigate an underfunded child care support system.

The study is called "Jumping Through Hoops and Set Up to Fail."

Amy O'Leary is director of the Early Education for All Campaign with Strategies for Children, an independent advocacy and policy group. She says the state does provide some public funding for pre-kindergarten, but most of it is tied to special education students.

"Most of our funding for early education and care in Massachusetts is federal dollars,” she points out. “And then often states overlay, kind of, state requirements on that. And sometimes it becomes, 'Is this what we have to do to get the funding? Or do we just kind of put this stipulation?'"

O'Leary says the report finds that in Massachusetts, early child care costs more than $15,000 a year for parents with an infant and about $12,000 a year with a four-year-old.

She agrees with a major report finding, that the nation really does not figure the true cost of child care.

She adds infant care in the Bay State can top $20,000 a year, according to research from Child Care Aware.

Judith Warner, a senior fellow with the Center for American Progress and the study's author,
adds that parents who qualify for assistance with child care expenses often aren't given a lot of help to navigate the system.

"You're dependent on people who may or may not lose your paperwork, and may or may not want to help you,” she points out. “And if things go wrong, your child loses a stable, good place in child care that brings them so many advantages."

The Center for American Progress report makes some recommendations, including less paperwork for parents and more child care funding.

Last fall, the group also proposed a High-Quality Child Care Tax Credit, worth up to $14,000 s per child, based on family income. The money would be paid directly to a child care provider chosen by parents.





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