Item 2- Travis County Voter-Approved Child Care and Out-of-School Time Initiative updates — original pdf

Backup

Travis County Voter Approved Child Care and Out of School Time Fund Presentation to the Early Childhood Council May 14, 2025 Background On November 5, 2024, Travis County voters approved Prop A. By approving Prop A, Travis County residents approved a 2.5 cent tax rate increase per $100 valuation on property taxes. This will generate approximately $75 million. The money from these property taxes will be collected in a special fund. This fund will support programs in Travis County that: • Increase access to affordable and high-quality child care and out of school time programs; • Increase capacity and strengthen the quality of child care and out of school time programs; and • Support opportunities for parents to work, participate in job training, and further their education. Overview of Strategies These four strategies will serve as a baseline for expanding and strengthening child care and afterschool and summer programming in Travis County.  Strategy 1: Expand slots for infants/toddlers (ages 0-3) and for afterschool and summer programming (PreK-12th grade)  Strategy 2: Expand non-traditional hour care  Strategy 3: Build quality and capacity  Strategy 4: Build a Business Government Alliance for leveraging business contributions and matching public funds to reduce employee child care costs Transition Plan • Staffing: Hiring staff at Health and Human Services and in other County Departments • Community Engagement Activities: Sharing an update and gathering community insight and feedback • Online survey • Targeted community input sessions stakeholder groups • Three in-person community listening sessions and one online zoom session. • Community Advisory Council: Planning for a community advisory committee composed of community members and child care and out of school time stakeholders. Application process - Summer 2025. • Short term investments: Exploring amending existing County contracts and implementing Interlocal Agreements to serve more families while planning and procurement for services is underway. Next Steps in Procuring Services • As a government entity collecting and investing public tax dollars we use a multi-step procurement process to fund services. • The process to plan and procure services within the four baseline strategies includes: • Refining initial strategy design by learning from other communities, analyzing community input, and aligning with County policies, procedures, and systems. • Seeking approval of program policies by Commissioner’s Court. • Developing scopes of work for County services. • Releasing solicitations, evaluating proposals, and negotiating new contracts. • A contracted third-party evaluator will evaluate all services and impact. • Solicitations for services will be staggered and will begin in Fall 2025 and new service contracts will begin throughout 2026. Emerging Timeline Community Input gathering February - April 2025 Review and analyze community input May-June 2025 Recruit for Community Advisory Council Summer 2025 Expand current contracts (Short-term Investments) Summer 2025 Begin releasing phased solicitations for services Fall 2025 Present community input findings and seek approval of program policies from Court Summer 2025 Contracts for services in all 4 strategies will begin by December 2026