Utah's Child Care Crisis Deepens as State Lawmakers Reject Funding Proposals

Despite federal pandemic relief temporarily easing the shortage, the expiration of most of that funding and the rejection of state dollar replacements have left child care providers struggling to stay afloat.

• Utah, despite having the nation's highest percentage of children, has faced a decades-long child care crisis, with a larger proportion of Utahans living in areas with few or no licensed child care facilities than in any other state.
• Federal pandemic relief funding eased the shortage by helping day care owners cover basic expenses and providing child care subsidies to lower-income families, increasing the number of licensed child care slots by about 30% from March 2020 to August 2023.
• However, most of that federal funding expired in September 2023, and Utah legislators have rejected proposals to replace it with state dollars, continuing decades of local opposition to expanding and improving outside-of-home care for young children.
• As a result, many child care providers are being forced to raise their rates or let employees go and care for fewer kids while working longer hours for less pay, with some considering closing their doors and changing careers.
• Advocates attribute lawmakers' resistance to subsidizing child care, in part, to the makeup of the Legislature, with 74% of lawmakers being male as of 2023, and an even larger share being Republicans, some of whom view child care as a personal, not societal, problem that shouldn't require government intervention.

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