House Early Childhood and Human Services committee advances child-care and social-services bills to Ways and Means

House Committee on Early Childhood and Human Services members on April 8 advanced a package of bills affecting child care, nutrition and human services and referred them with due-pass recommendations to the Joint Committee on Ways and Means.

The measures approved in work sessions included an increase to child-care meal reimbursements (House Bill 3201), a new grant program for child care resource and referral entities (House Bill 2452), a rename and stakeholder review of the employment-related day care subsidy (House Bill 2593), a pilot allowing some adult foster homes to serve up to seven residents (House Bill 2956), creation of a task force to study recruitment and retention of case managers and adult-protective-services workers (House Bill 2061), and a requirement that DHS annually adjust provider payments tied to an earlier rate-and-wage study (House Bill 2150). Committee members debated funding levels, program overlap and administrative capacity before voting to move the bills to Ways and Means for fiscal review.

The child-nutrition bill, House Bill 3201, would direct the Oregon Department of Education to adopt policies to increase access to healthy, culturally relevant meals in child care. The bill raises the per-meal reimbursement for eligible meals and snacks under the federal Child and Adult Care Food Program by 10 cents above the federal reimbursement baseline, directs the department to equalize reimbursement rates across program tiers and creates a supplemental fund. The measure includes a $250,000 general-fund appropriation to the Oregon State University Extension Service to develop culturally specific menus and requires the extension service to collaborate with communities and enter a grant agreement with ODE. The dash-1 amendment adds a June 30, 2027 sunset for the extension-service menu-creation provision and declares an emergency with an effective date of July 1, 2025. Representative Ruiz asked whether the menu work and reimbursement increase could be federally reimbursed; committee members asked staff and stakeholders to follow up with a memo to clarify federal match and fiscal effects.

House Bill 2452 would direct the Department of Early Learning and Care to…