$500 Million Child Care Assistance Remains Unclaim, Here’s How To Apply

$500 million in child care assistance within each state under the American Rescue Plan.

$500 million in child care assistance within each state under the American Rescue Plan.

The Child Care Assistance

In a published article in The US Sun,  several households do not know how to apply for aid and the money is going unspent. In New York last year, $2.2billion in federal funding was received to assist child care providers and families. Furthermore, almost $500million remaining are unclaimed from the grants in 2020 and 2021, because many families don’t know it’s out there. reported by North Country Public Radio. A recent report by The Children’s Agenda. It searched for several pieces of criteria, such as applications for subsidies and income eligibility criteria, and found out that most counties did not have that information.

In March 2021, the American Rescue Plan was passed with a $1.9trillion emergency relief bill. A total of $39billion was set aside for the child care stabilization grant. These funds were intended to provide relief for child care providers and support for families who are struggling to pay for child care. Every state has designated budgeted for family programs, including child care.

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New York’s Child Care Support

Child care vouchers in New York City helps to cover the cost of child care for children aged six months to 13 years old. Children up to 18 years old with disabilities are also covered. People can then use their vouchers at any of the hundreds of NYC home-based and center-based providers which accept the child care vouchers. Due to high demand, those who require assistance will be placed on a waitlist.

The website also stated that the Administration of Children’s Services will notify families on the voucher waitlist when more funds are available. Meanwhile, The Children’s Agenda of the Office of Children and Family Services is projected to roll over $192.4million in federal child care funds from the federal fiscal year 2021 to 2022. Child Care Aware of America released its study in late 2021 and found states have a year from the first deadline to distribute the funds they received.