By Dr. Rebecca Percy
Guest Opinion
As a mom of four and pediatrician with Castle Valley Children’s Clinic in Carbondale and New Castle, I am proud to support ballot measure 7A for more affordable childcare and early childhood education in our community. Right alongside housing and healthcare, our region’s lack of accessible childcare is a critical concern and we must give this issue the attention it deserves.
It is in all of our best interests, as a community, to work together and advocate for creative solutions to help alleviate this crisis. I have worked for the past 12 years with local parents and families, and I constantly hear them express the need for better early childcare opportunities that they can afford and rely on. This is understandable considering that there are licensed childcare spots available to less than half of our local kids — just 44% from Parachute to Aspen, according to recent studies.
Our local childcare options are in short supply, and are out of reach financially for most families. I’ve listened to countless stories about how parents are unable to find options that fit their budgets and schedules. They are frequently forced to juggle care of their children between friends, neighbors, relatives or sitters in different locations throughout the week. At best, this is a deeply stressful situation for parents to muddle through before their child enters kindergarten; at worst, it’s a barrier to being able to raise a family in our region altogether. It’s no surprise that many parents are simply moving out of our community for other places where they can find the early childhood support systems they need.
From my experience working with our youngest local children, I know that they thrive on consistency. Stable, reliable, high-quality care and early childhood education programs are essential for growing early language skills, social-emotional wellness, physical development and so much more. Research has shown time and again that when our youngest children have access to early reading, writing, experiential activities and structured play curriculum, they are more likely to start kindergarten engaged and ready to learn. This leads to improvement of scholastic performance, higher rates of graduation, stronger potential for career success and healthier overall outcomes for the individual’s life and beyond.
We can, quite literally, make our community stronger and more successful by investing in early childhood programs. In our current situation, as detailed above, our lack of structured, supportive early childhood care is not only going to fail our children currently, but our community in the future.
And our community may fail. Families are leaving because they can’t find or afford childcare here. This is an existential problem for our workforce, our economy, our cultural vitality and the way of life that we all cherish in this valley. Affordable, reliable, abundant early childhood programs help give parents the chance to remain in their careers or continue their education while their kids are being cared for by qualified adults. This not only brings positive impacts to our region’s economy but more importantly ensures that parents can provide sufficient housing, food, clothing and other resources to their own children. Parents should not have to leave our community to find this basic infrastructure of support elsewhere.
And for families who do stick around? The children within them need our help, now.
This fall, we as a community have a chance to harness the power of investing in early childhood. Ballot measure 7A offers a pathway to alleviating the local childcare crisis through tuition assistance for families and grants for childcare providers to pay their teachers stronger salaries and create more spots for kids. Please join me and thousands of other local residents in committing to a yes vote on 7A, for our kids.
If you want more research behind this: check out the extraordinary work of Nobel Prize-winning economist James Heckman, who found that comprehensive programs for kids five and under yield a 13% return on investment. It’s motivating stuff for anyone who wants a stronger, more sustainable future for our region.