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Multiple early‑learning and Head Start providers ask the committee for capital support to expand childcare and toddler services
Summary
Several nonprofit and district leaders testified that Oregon faces childcare deserts and unmet need for infants, toddlers and children with disabilities; they asked SB 5531 funding to finish construction and purchase modular facilities.
Speakers representing early‑learning providers, Head Start programs and an education service district asked the committee for capital dollars to expand childcare capacity and meet high demand for specialized services.
Stacy Reager, executive director of early learning for the Northwest Regional ESD, said families in her area face a childcare crisis and asked for $2,000,000 to close the final gap on a nearly $19.8 million, 50,000‑square‑foot early learning center designed to serve children including those with disabilities. “This facility has been designed to support partnerships between preschools, child cares, and our early intervention and special education teams,” Reager said.
Sue Ellen Whitlock, senior director at Umatilla‑Morrow Head Start, described an aging Hermiston Child Development Center — a 34‑year‑old modular building serving 34 infants and toddlers — and asked the committee to consider roughly $900,000 to close a shortfall on a $1.2 million modular replacement project to maintain licensing compliance.
Other testimony requested funds to renovate or open Head Start classrooms in Gladstone, expand childcare co‑locations, and support local early‑learning capital campaigns. Representatives emphasized that federal and operating grants typically do not cover capital costs and that one‑time state capital dollars are central to expanding physical capacity.
