The Indiana Chamber led a broad-based coalition of advocates urging the Indiana General Assembly to accelerate efforts to reform the state’s childcare system during nearly five hours of testimony at the August meeting of the Interim Study Committee on Public Health, Behavioral Health and Human Services.
Erin Emerson, president/CEO of the Perry County Development Corporation (an Indiana Chamber member) and volunteer board president for her county’s only licensed childcare center, may have summarized the severity of Indiana’s childcare crisis best: “The system is broken from every single angle. It does not work for providers. It does not work for parents, and clearly, employers are struggling to find a workforce.”
Thankfully, with the strong advocacy from the Chamber and other coalition partners in recent years, a growing number of state lawmakers have taken notice and seem primed to take meaningful action toward closing Indiana’s glaring childcare access and affordability gaps. Study committee chairman Sen. Ed Charboneau (R-Valparaiso) rightly stressed that childcare is a statewide “infrastructure issue” and expressed his intention for the committee to “come up with some significant decisions on how we’re going to change things” with an eye toward the upcoming legislative session.
Based on discussions with policymakers and coalition partners, the Chamber anticipates that the General Assembly will consider – and ideally accelerate – high-priority regulatory changes during the 2024 non-budget session while laying the groundwork for more transformative changes to funding in 2025.
In the meantime, the Chamber is moving full speed ahead to support the design and statewide rollout of Indiana’s new $25 million Employer-Sponsored Childcare Fund this fall. Championed by the Chamber in tandem with a new employer tax credit, the state grants will provide seed funding to help employers and community partners increase childcare access and capacity in their regions.
