Gov. Healey highlights new early education rates at Westfield childcare center

WESTFIELD, MA (WGGB/WSHM) -- Governor Maura Healey was in western Massachusetts on Thursday. One of her stops was a children’s learning center in Westfield where she discussed the impact of increased funding to help make childcare more affordable.

A $65 million investment in childcare is now in full force. At Roots Learning Center in Westfield, Healey, along with Massachusetts Secretary of Education Dr. Patrick Tutwiler and Early Education and Care Commissioner Amy Kershaw, met with childcare providers to celebrate a new initiative that is helping to pay salaries and make child care more affordable for families.

“We’re supporting big grants for childcare providers. That means more childcare places can open with more staff, which means more seats and availability for kids which is what we want. We want to see our young people having access to high quality Pre-K and that’s what’s happening,” Healey said.

Among the providers in attendance were Square One, The Kid’s Place, and Boys and Girls Club of Greater Westfield, whose chief operating officer Kellie Brown said the new rates have already been a huge help.

“It’s allowed us to increase salaries, help our staff with education, help our families with more affordable childcare, also allow us to provide free lunch, free breakfast, and free supper for our kids,” Brown said.

The following is some of what Brown meant when it comes to these benefits. Their staff’s salaries have been increased by $1 to $2 an hour and parent fees have been reduced from $12 to $15 a week to $2 to $3 a week. There are even some families that are only paying cents for child care.

As for the rates overall, there are now increases for center-based programs to at least 81 percent of the cost of care for rates that are not at or above the 80 percent level, plus daily rates for center-based providers in western Massachusetts are increasing by 34 percent for infants, 14 percent for toddlers and 13 percent for preschoolers, all relative to the 2023 fiscal year. Brown told Western Mass News that it is vital considering how COVID-19 impacted child education.

“Socialization skills (and) education really fell off the charts,” Brown explained. “Now, kids are going into kindergarten universal, so all of the kids in the community are learning at the same rate, only at different providers and organizations.”

In the end, Healey said the main goal is to make life more affordable for families in the commonwealth.

“Our first order of business is to make sure that we implement this and do it well because we have changed eligibility now. Now, more families are going to be eligible, so we want to take care of business, getting people processed, getting people and their children in seats,” Healey added.

While some providers have already seen the impacts of these rates, all of the rates are expected to go into effect by the end of the month.