Local childcare providers in Bowling Green facing financial strains

BOWLING GREEN, Ky.- Daycare workers in Bowling Green are facing financial difficulties due to low wages.

“They don’t pay enough money.” Tammy Alexander, the Director of Bumblebee Learning Center, said childcare businesses are being strained in bowling green due to low wages.

According to the Economic Policy Institute, the annual cost of infant care in Kentucky is $730 a month. Their studies show that’s just 25.1 percent less than average rent.

The Cabinet for Health and Family Services Department for Community Based Services shows that the maximum payment rate for childcare in Kentucky is $47 per day, per child for a Licensed Type 1 Provider and that’s the highest rate across all counties in the Commonwealth from childcare assistance through the state.

The lowest rate was $8 for a part-time Registered Provider per day, per child from CCAP. Some daycares run on grants and tuition. Alexander said most of those funds go towards resources to take care of the children leaving providers with smaller checks.

“They don’t pay staff enough money, they don’t. It’s just one of the essentials I think that all over the country that is needed and that’s childcare and we can’t keep workers because we can’t pay them enough,” she said.

She said the workers aren’t the only ones being financially strained, but families are too.

“The women or families that have to go to work, they can’t afford what little bit we do charge for childcare in order to have a business,” Alexander said.

The state of Kentucky offers a childcare assistance program called CCAP for families that are at the threshold of or below 85% of the state median income based on the family’s size.

She said with the financial ship rocking back and forward on all parties, the most important anchor is keeping kids educated and growing. 

“That’s our future. It’s very important. Who’s going to be the next president? Who’s going to be the doctor working on you? who is going to be your policeman or whatever the careers that these children have. the foundation of their lives, the most important part of their lives are the first five years,” Alexander said.

Alexander also said the shortage of childcare providers rising in bowling green could be a domino effect into the school system.

“It’s daycare centers like this that prepare those children to even go into a school setting and it’s a struggle for the kids. It’s a struggle for the teachers to be able to handle a child that has not had any foundation of teaching at all. knowing how to sit, talk, walk, all of those things are very, very important,” she said.

If you need childcare assistance you can apply on the KYNECT portal.