MONROE — The Green County Child Care Network (GCCCN) invited the two senate and two assembly candidates for the Green County area to their October meeting. Both Senate candidates declined due to scheduling conflicts, but both assembly candidates attended. The meeting started out with fire safety training and fire extinguisher inspections. Then both assembly candidates each had the individual opportunity to meet with members for 45 minutes to discuss their ideas, ask questions, and answer questions.

Bill Oemichen, running as a Democrat for Assembly District 50, went first. He shared that child care is one of his top three priorities because he understands that it is important to both child development and provides long term economic returns. He said that he is proud to have spoken at all five of the annual GCCCN Day Without Child Care Network’s events. He shared the story of how his daughter’s child care provider was the one who helped them understand that their child likely needed special education resources and helped them get her diagnosed and access the Birth-3 system. He spoke about co-ops as a possible way to access health care and lower operational costs. However, it is not the solution to the foundational issue of cost to parents and low wages for the educators. He also spoke about how child care programs are valuable as they provide year-round care (schools are nine months) and more hours per day than schools are, and, as school board president, worked to strengthen the relationships between the school district and regulated providers. One solution for funding was a dedicated revenue source like New Mexico has done to invest in their universal child care system.

Jon Aleckson, running as a Republican for Assembly District 50, started off by stating rural areas are experiencing a child care crisis, but that he is surprised he isn’t hearing that from more people as he is out knocking on doors and talking to people. Nevertheless, child care is a top issue for him as it is a “workforce and a family issue.” He came prepared with several questions for the group and each was discussed robustly. The questions ranged from no state income tax for child care educators — which won’t help the over 50% who don’t earn enough to owe state income taxes — to apprenticeships for high schoolers. The group said yes, but they can’t pay them so it creates a need for a Minnesota-type program where the participants are paid through a separate grant program and they aren’t included in ratio so they and the children receive the support they deserve. Aleckson also asked if the network would support a commission to study the crisis and bring people together in conversation. Members supported that idea. The discussion was then how to get people to participate as that is what the network does with the Community Conversations and Day Without Child Care events it sponsors. After the meeting, Aleckson followed up stating, “The viability of child care in Green County is at a crisis level and we need to immediately form a state commission with a firm deadline to come up with public/private solutions to mitigate this crisis.” He also thanked the providers for the invitation, saying, “Groups like the Green County Child Care Network are incredibly important to advocate and help bring awareness to this crisis. I was happy to participate despite our disagreements on the solutions.”

The Green County Child Care Network thanked both candidates for taking the time to have open, honest, and robust discussions about child care and for each acknowledging child care is a crisis that impacts the communities in Green County.