On brass tacks and banana peels

In 2018 I attended my first ever Congressional town hall. It was with the Democrat running for my district who, colleagues assured me, was a champion for child care in the New York State Assembly. 

I remember what I asked him very clearly because I was so upset by his response:

My name is Katie Albitz. I had to leave the job I loved as a toddler teacher because I had no path to pay that would make ends meet. I made $8.50 per hour caring for and teaching 10 toddlers at [a nonprofit] rural extension program. I was on my dad’s health insurance, but most of my colleagues relied on Medicaid. I couldn't afford my student loans or a car. When you're in Congress, will you support legislation that ensures families can afford child care and people like me can afford to stay in this important job?

I never got a straight answer. Even though people in the audience murmured “that's not right” and a couple even clapped for my question, he wouldn’t commit to anything substantive or relevant. Instead, he pivoted. He had talking points prepared about legislation to lower interest rates on federal student loans that he wanted to talk about instead. 

He went on to win that election and became the Blue Dog Coalition's Co-Chair. When I went to Washington DC in 2019 to talk to his office, he was outside the door and brushed me off to talk to a business group. I spoke with his staffer, but didn’t come away feeling the Congressman would take meaningful action. Ultimately, he never supported the bill I asked him to cosponsor, the Child Care for Working Families Act.

Several months before that town hall, I met with members of Congress in Washington DC for the first time, including his Republican predecessor. By then, I’d attended protests against her for over a year and was incredibly anxious going into a meeting with her staff alone. When I went to her office, her staffer was intensely interested in what I had to say. He took pages of notes. He said as a single mother, the Representative understood the importance of child care. A month later, in the midst of the horrific first Trump administration, the Child Care and Development Block Grant received the largest funding increase in its history to that point.

I am as far as you can be from an undecided voter. But if I wasn’t the politically engaged person I am, I would see one Democrat who heard me, brushed me off, and didn't care, and one Republican who said things I disagreed with, but supported the cause that means the most to me. 

In 2020, after serving only one term, the Democrat was one of 8 Blue Dogs to lose their seat.

It's 2024 now, and some political strategists have decided that in the aftermath of the election, the most important thing Democrats can do is not address child poverty or the fact that there isn't enough child care for families. These strategists suggest that the most important thing Democrats can do right now to prove they understand the working class is emulate legislation rooted in a misinterpretation (or an overly cautious misread) of Washington State child care food safety regulations, spearheaded by the Blue Dog Coalition’s current co-chair, Marie Glusenkamp Perez.

To the strategists putting this forward as a commonsense appeal to popular concerns: if you think it’s unimportant to make sure the fruit fed to toddlers in their child care programs is safe from fecal matter contamination, we’re not on the same side of this issue. Otherwise, may I humbly suggest you pick another example.

If a child care center owner can't afford to have two sinks in each classroom, it's because there isn't funding for programs to build new construction or retrofit existing buildings and homes to meet the needs of caring for small children. Small business loans don’t work in an industry where breaking even day-to-day is close to impossible, let alone repaying large capital loans. Philanthropy can’t fill every gap. Luckily, a bill exists to address this problem: the Child Care Workforce and Facilities Act of 2024, which Glusenkamp Perez should consider cosponsoring.

If child care educators are feeling so burnt out and unsupported that banana peels are their breaking point, well, the Child Care Workforce and Facilities Act addresses that too. As does the Child Care for Working Families Act. The child care workforce earns less than nearly all other occupations in this country. They care for our babies while struggling to care for their own. It’s past time for the federal government to put in its fair share to pay them.

If lack of trust in government is causing a child care provider to be overly cautious and refuse to serve fruit instead of using gloves, then let’s talk about bias and punitive licensing enforcement culture. Let’s talk about coaching and supportive partnerships to help programs stay in compliance and keep kids healthy and safe. Let’s build relationships instead of trying to legislate away perceived obstacles that are rooted in disease prevention.

Our market-based child care system is fundamentally broken. It doesn’t work for families, children, or the child care educators they rely on. And yes, regulations are often convoluted, counterintuitive, and misguided. What Americans do not need is bipartisan rhetoric conflating “red tape” with important health and safety regulations.

Talking around the problems Americans struggle with every day instead of addressing them head on is part of what got us a second Trump administration. Your constituents can tell when you’re evading brass tacks to fixate on banana peels.

Took a detour from the next part of our series to address this topic while it is still in the discourse for once. If you haven’t been hearing about bananas for the last two weeks then, well, consider yourself lucky.

Tradwife piece coming soon, followed by another aside to share what I’ll be carrying into what is shaping up to be a daunting new year in child care policy.