On Friday, Capital Tonight spent the morning at Joyful Beginnings Early Education Child Care Center in Waterford, which serves infants, toddlers and preschoolers in the greater Capital Region. There, Capital Tonight met Gov. Kathy Hochul to discuss her agenda, which includes a substantial increase in the child tax credit for families, as well as money to build more childcare facilities. 

“We've increased wages over a number of years — tax credits for families, $1,000 for a child under the age of four,” Hochul told Capital Tonight. “Up until I became governor, that number was zero. And so, I focused hard on giving money to families, knowing that their biggest cost is child care; $21,000 a year for average families — that's impossible for a lot of struggling parents.”

When the governor claims to have done more for child care than other governors, she’s not exaggerating. The state’s investment in child care assistance has quadrupled during her tenure. Four years ago, funding for the entire child care assistance program was $800 million. It’s now $1.8 billion.

But the governor did not include funding in her executive budget this year to bolster the child care workforce, something the Child Care Availability Task Force (CCATF) strongly recommended in its roadmap released earlier this month.

When asked why, Hochul pointed to the $110 million in facilities funding and said, “You need to build capacity first; I have to have places to put these children.”

But Dede Hill, director of policy for the Schuyler Center for Analysis & Advocacy, a member of the CCATF, disagrees with the governor’s analysis. 

“I was a little surprised and a little disappointed,” Hill told Capital Tonight. “The CCATF earlier this month on Jan. 6 released a roadmap to universal child care. This is the crowning report. This roadmap lays out, as the name implies, a sequencing for phasing in universal child care.”

Hill said the governor’s decision not to include temporary workforce grants – grants that had been included in the last two budgets – could be viewed as a cut.

One reason for the absence of workforce funding is likely its cost. Hill estimates that it would cost New York state $1.2 billion more per year to begin the process of creating universal child care.

But Hochul’s vision for universal child care isn’t government funded — at least not completely. Instead, her budget creates a New York Coalition for Child Care to identify a sustainable funding stream to implement universal child care. 

It’s clear the governor sees the business community as central to that calculation. And she points to the Micron deal she helped negotiate as a model.

“…when we spoke to them about getting state support with our Green CHIPS bill, which gave them assistance to build semiconductors here, I said I also want child care — I want to make sure that we have an opportunity for more women to go into these high-paying tech jobs,” she said.  “So they literally, literally right now, are building an on site child care center. This, to me, is the model, and that's why we're talking about what the commitment of the business community is, because this is great for families, but it's also great for your workforce.”

In a statement shared with Capital Tonight, the Business Council of New York State appeared to support the governor’s vision.

“For larger companies this makes sense and is one of many ways to solve the issue and we look forward to further discussion on ways to support a multi-pronged approach to affordable access to childcare for all families,” BCNYS spokesman Pat Bailey said.

But the Schuyler Center’s Hill is worried that without significant government support, a fair wage for universal child care may be out of reach.

“Now, we have families who can gain access to assistance but cannot find a child care program with space for their child, and the number one reason for that is actually not the lack of brick and mortar programs, but insufficient staff,” she said.

EDITOR'S NOTE: This story has been changed to reflect that the funding for the entire child care assistance program is now $1.8 billion.