KENT COUNTY, Mich. — Childcare is set to be front and center for Kent County commissioners, as they're set to help decide the future of the county's Ready by Five childcare millage.
"[The millage] generally provides needs for those children such as prenatal services for moms, early intervention services for children who might have a developmental delay, home visiting," Together West Michigan member Megan Cottrell said. "It provides funding for different nonprofits around town that help families and their young children."
It's one that some local advocates, including those at local organization Together West Michigan (TWM), say is necessary to not only keep, but build upon.
"My wife and I and the other grandparents in our kids' lives said we would give three days a week to childcare," TWM leadership member Andrew Ryskamp said. "And so, we saw firsthand what difference that made in their lives and what they would have paid, even if they had given us, you know, $10 an hour."
But with the first six-year millage period up this year, the future of the funding is uncertain. To either continue or change the millage in the future, the county board of commissioners would need to put it to the voters.
Citing a new study that suggests Kent County would need approximately 20,500 additional childcare spots for kids to meet local demand, some are asking for a vote on whether to increase the funding from its current level of 25 cents for every $1,000 in taxable property value.
"We know that we have about 50,000 children in Kent County who need daily care because their parents work or want to work," Cottrell said. "We only have spots for about 30,000 of them."
One such request, submitted by the Ready by Five Millage Steering Committee, asked for ballot language that would propose an increase to 45 cents per $1,000.
"How can we pour money into downtown and bring new jobs and new people, if we can't take care of the children and the families that we have already?" Cottrell said, referencing concurrent consideration of a potential vote on whether to raise the local lodging tax to fund amenities such as a soccer stadium and amphitheater.
According to Cottrell her group has no objection to the consideration of funding for those amenities, but that they would likely oppose it if it was not coupled with an opportunity to increase childcare funding.
However, a subcommittee of three commissioners released a report earlier this year recommending that the board put forth a proposal to voters that would ask whether to keep the millage rate at the current levels, and not ask voters whether to increase it further.
In the report, they concluded that more time should be given to study data and outcomes of the current millage, so taxpayers have a clear sense of its impacts before being asked whether to change it.
"More robust data about the effectiveness of the millage-funded services to prepare children for kindergarten will be available in Spring 2024 and ongoing as more participating children reach school age," the report reads. "That will provide an opportunity to communicate with with taxpayers specific outcomes of the investments, the positive impacts on children and families and the potential opportunity to ask voters to consider a higher millage rate."
"The Subcommittee does not recommend increasing to 0.45 or 0.35 of one mill at this time, based on the yet unfinished formal assessment of the outcomes and effectiveness of the millage," the report continues. "The Subcommittee concludes that voters should have that data and confidence in the results of the Ready by Five investment before requesting a larger millage rate on a ballot."
But for some, they believe the wait would be too long.
"If we wait another six years, that's another group of children who have not been able to receive quality child care, who have not had the proper brain growth development, who have not been given resources that they could be given," Everbloom Montessori Cooperative Co-Director and TWM member Emily Jacobson said.
The full county commission will meet on Thursday, where, according to their public agenda, they're expected to take up the vote on whether to put that millage on the ballot in one of the elections later this year and what language will be included should they do so.
►Make it easy to keep up to date with more stories like this. Download the 13 ON YOUR SIDE app now.
Have a news tip? Email news@13onyourside.com, visit our Facebook page or Twitter. Subscribe to our YouTube channel.
Watch 13 ON YOUR SIDE for free on Roku, Amazon Fire TV Stick, Apple TV and on your phone.