OPINION: Do Alaska’s budget priorities include children and families?

$11,039,001 of federal funding is hanging in the balance. This is the exact amount of Alaskan’s federal tax dollars that are specifically used to serve children and families in our state, employ our friends and neighbors, and allow many other Alaskans to have a safe place to leave their children so they can go to work. The Alaska Senate and Gov. Mike Dunleavy can help immediately.

Why is this the case? Because Head Start programs in our state are not able to recruit and retain the employees needed to serve the numbers of children that federal Head Start grants require.

There are 17 Head Start programs in Alaska who currently receive $60 million annually in federal grants for operations and services. In addition, we pull in significant federal capital dollars to build new and maintain existing facilities. In the past five months, six of these programs from all around the state have received under-enrollment letters documenting that they each have 12 months to get fully enrolled. If they do not, these letters threaten to withhold $11 million (18%) of that annual amount and it will no longer be available for services in communities around the state. Fewer children will be served, fewer Alaskans will be employed and fewer families will have an option for their children to learn and become more prepared for school while they go to work.

As an example, the program I work at in the Mat-Su, CCS Early Learning, has always had (and continues to have) a huge waiting list of eligible children to serve. Our program has never been under-enrolled, but COVID-19 and the resulting labor market has resulted in severe understaffing and we are currently at 65% enrollment. Our program’s under-enrollment letter threatens to pull $2.46 million from the Mat Su if we aren’t fully enrolled by April 2024. Our community and our state desperately needs us to be fully staffed -- so we can be fully enrolled. Last year, one of every two children enrolled at CCS was eligible for services because they were either in foster care or homeless.

Wages and benefits in early childhood education have always been low, and the costs of doing business in Alaska are high. Head Start programs rely on grant revenues to keep up with inflation. The State of Alaska long ago committed to provide the 20% match that our federal Head Start grants require so that our essential services to children and families in Alaska would be strengthened. However, state funding has not budged since 2010. It has been flat-funded at $6.8 million, and the state match for these federal grants is now down to 12%.

Thankfully the state House of Representatives has recognized the urgency and importance of this issue and added $5 million of additional Head Start funding into their version of next year’s budget. This would return the state match to 20% and allow programs to make immediate increases to wages and benefits. This is crucial if we are to recruit and retain employees to do this difficult and very important work.

The state Senate budget has no increase. Today, please contact your senator and the governor and let them know that prioritizing Alaska children and families who need the most support and keeping all of your federal tax dollars at work in our very own state -- instead of in other states -- needs to be urgently accomplished.

Continuing to play this game in Juneau of kicking the can down the road without a fiscal plan and without our priorities clearly determined is completely unacceptable and totally irresponsible. Alaska’s children, families and businesses need strong Head Start programs, and all of the federal investment we can get. It’s long overdue for us to pick up that can and put it on the shelf once and for all.

Mark Lackey serves as executive director of CCS Early Learning in Wasilla.

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