Kansas Commerce Committee hears overview of childcare system, workforce study and funding updates

The Kansas House Commerce Committee spent its Feb. 14 meeting on a multi-presenter briefing about the state’s childcare system, hearing a workforce study that surveyed almost 6,000 early childhood professionals, an update on licensing and regulatory changes from the Kansas Department of Health and Environment (KDHE), an overview of Head Start and home visiting programs, and a fiscal overview from the Kansas Children’s Cabinet and Trust Fund about pandemic-era investments and a childcare capacity accelerator.

John Wilson, president and CEO of Kansas Action for Children, opened the session by framing childcare as both a children’s issue and an economic development issue. “Parents can’t afford to pay more and providers can’t afford to make less,” Wilson told the committee, summarizing a theme that recurred throughout the presentations.

A workforce study led by Kansas Childcare Training Opportunities (CASETO/CASEDO) and presented by Dr. Stephanie Parks, Dr. Clarissa Corkins and Patty Peschel surveyed nearly 6,000 providers across all 105 Kansas counties and reported a 24% response rate. The study found that most early childhood workers view themselves as professionals — Parks noted about 79% agreed or strongly agreed with that statement — but many face persistent financial stress: 36% of full‑time childcare workers reported annual earnings under $25,000 and 18% relied on additional jobs. The presenters also reported that 27% of respondents said they experienced food insecurity, most did not receive employer‑provided retirement or health benefits, and turnover was a dominant theme in focus groups.

The study asked the roughly 669 respondents who had left the field what influenced their decision; pay was reported as the top influence by nearly three‑quarters of that subgroup. In the survey’s open responses, Parks said the three most commonly requested policy supports were higher pay, employer benefits, and targeted grants or incentives to stabilize programs.

KDHE bureau director Derek Flerlage described the agency’s role: KDHE licenses facilities (not individuals), conducts annual on‑site inspections, and enforces health and safety regulations for family child care homes, centers, preschool and school‑age programs. He said KDHE receives most of its funding for those functions through DCF and the federal Child Care and Development Fund (CCDF). Flerlage walked the committee through a multiyear trend showing a decline in home‑based providers and a modest increase in centers, while total licensed capacity for child care slots is at its highest level since KDHE began tracking the metric. He cautioned that licensed capacity does not equal filled slots; KDHE cannot currently capture how many licensed slots are actually being used on any given day.

On regulatory changes, Flerlage said KDHE completed a regulatory review that took effect Aug. 2, 2024. Among the changes KDHE reported: consolidation of two home license types into one, lowering the toddler age cutoff from 18 to 12 months (which opens infant slots sooner), modest increases in permitted center ratios and maximums, updates to medication administration and CPR training to reflect federal rules, strengthened background‑check procedures and expanded recognition of experience for staff qualifications. Flerlage emphasized KDHE’s use of transition plans to phase in compliance rather than immediate enforcement and described ongoing pilots, including a small‑center license designed to fill a gap between family homes and larger centers in counties such as Clark, Kingman, Ellis, McPherson and Rollins.

Heather Schroberger of the Kansas Head Start Association described Head Start and Early Head Start programs and the role of evidence‑based home visiting models (for example, Parents as Teachers, Healthy Families America and Early Head Start home visiting). She said Kansas has 25 Head Start grantees serving roughly 6,200 infants and toddlers and about 40,700 preschool slots through Head Start programs statewide, and noted that Head Start combines early education with health screening and family supports.

Melissa Rooker of the Kansas Children’s Cabinet and Trust Fund gave a fiscal overview of pandemic‑era investments and the state’s multi‑agency early childhood “mixed delivery” system. Rooker said Kansas received about $460 million in pandemic relief funding for childcare purposes; of that amount, she cited $213,897,405 in CCDF pandemic relief funds used for stabilization purposes. The Cabinet led a childcare capacity accelerator that braided multiple funding sources — $20 million in state ARPA (spark) funds, $31 million from DCF, $38 million from US Treasury ARPA capital projects, and private gifts including a roughly $2.5 million Patterson Family Foundation grant — to expand licensed slots and build capacity in communities. Rooker said accelerator projects are on track to create 5,655 new licensed slots once complete, with about 3,600 slots already opened and 402 new providers hired so far; the Cabinet required community match and coalition involvement for awards.

Committee members pressed presenters on several points including where the CASETO survey was distributed (centers and family homes), whether the team surveyed parents (it did not), sample‑size differences by question, and how KDHE and other agencies track closures and revocations. KDHE said formal revocations are rare and that the agency seeks to remediate regulatory concerns through training and technical assistance before taking enforcement actions. KDHE also said the state had a federal monitoring visit from the Office of Child Care and that KDHE inspection timeliness has been above 90% in recent reporting.

No committee action or vote on legislation occurred at the hearing; the chair said a bill hearing will be held when the panel reconvenes. Several committee members, including appropriators, asked for a fiscal inventory of the pandemic and stabilization funds and for more detailed reports ahead of the scheduled bill hearing.

Why it matters: presenters said the problems are systemic — low wages and sparse benefits for the early childhood workforce, fragmented funding across agencies, and variable availability of licensed care by geography — and many of the solutions discussed require coordination across agencies and continued funding. The committee was told a legislative bill proposing consolidation of governance and clearer fiscal maps may be heard at a later date to help the legislature better track where dollars flow and how to target them.

The committee left the record with several follow‑up commitments: KDHE and other agencies offered to provide county‑level supply/demand reports, a breakdown of CIF/health and safety grants, and more detailed spending and program‑outcome information ahead of the committee’s bill hearing.