As we continue to face the COVID-19 pandemic, a determined army of child care providers is on the frontlines of caring for our youngest San Diegans. Child care providers play an important role in our communities, yet they are often taken for granted. We know that our economy cannot recover without the child care that allows parents to keep working, and we know that our child care providers are facing a number of challenges in this pandemic.
Like many of us, child care providers have had to change the way they run their businesses and care for our children, especially when it comes to meeting the health and hygiene guidelines to prevent the spread of the virus. Providers need more disinfectants, hygiene wipes, soap and other important supplies to maintain the cleanliness and safety of their facilities. Yet they are often faced with empty shelves, long lines at stores, and tighter budgets, so convenient access to supplies is critical to help providers stay open and able to care for the children of working parents.
For 40 years, YMCA has supported child care providers, and that commitment took on extra importance during this pandemic. Once it became apparent that child care providers needed access to these important supplies, we worked quickly with partners to meet this need. In partnership with the San Diego Child Care Taskforce, we distributed over 1,400 supply kits for child care providers in May and June.
More recently, the YMCA held another distribution event on June 27 with funds made possible by state of emergency funds authorized by Governor Newsom. This program gives child care providers nearly $70 worth of supplies for each child in their care.
At this event, we distributed supplies to close to 100 providers and loaded over 7,000 items into cars for roughly $100,000 worth of supplies.
“On behalf of my wife who is a provider and not able to communicate in English well, I would like to thank you for the assistance and the best management of distribution of the items,” said one family.
Another child care provider said, “I want to send a huge thank you to YMCA Childcare Resource Service and all who organized and implemented this awesome gift. We felt like it was Christmas morning on Saturday! This entire experience has been easy and flawless, down to the pickup on Saturday.”
An additional 600 providers are signed up to receive supplies, and two more distribution events are scheduled for July.
For more information about our supplies child care providers, please contact Gaby Millan at [email protected].