Only half of childcare providers applied for provincial grants

Just over half of eligible B.C. childcare providers have applied to participate in a program aimed at reducing daycare fees for parents, according to the latest figures from the Ministry of Children and Family Development.

The Child Care Fee Reduction Initiative is part of the province’s three-year, billiondollar childcare plan, and is meant to cut daycare costs by up to $350 per month per space, depending on the age of the child and whether they are in licensed family or group daycare.

The money goes to the daycare, and the savings are passed on to families.

The program has been criticized by some providers who have questions about how the program will operate – in particular, how it will affect their ability to raise fees.

The deadline to apply for a fee increase was initially March 27, just eight days after contracts were sent to childcare providers. The ministry said 969 providers responded by that deadline.

After receiving inquiries and complaints from providers, the ministry decided to extend the deadline until April 20, meaning operators could offer parents the fee reduction for April and then be reimbursed by the province after they were approved. The ministry said that after approval, childcare operators typically receive payment within one to three days.

The program is not mandatory and operators can opt in at any time, although after April 20, it is not retroactive.

The ministry sent out 3,444 contracts to childcare providers in late March, more than 2,700 of which have been returned.

The contracts went to licensed childcare providers who receive provincial operating grants, about 2,850 of which are eligible to opt in to the fee reduction program because they operate facilities for infants and toddlers or children aged three to five.

Fifty-four per cent of those eligible operators, or 1,538, decided to apply for the fee reduction initiative. To date, 1,109, or 39 per cent of all eligible operators, have been approved. Those approved providers operate 1,431 facilities across the province, representing 22,072 spaces.

According to the ministry, they are waiting for additional information about recent or planned fee increases from 429 providers, representing more than 10,000 childcare spaces.

There are still 500 contracts waiting to be reviewed.

Fifty-six providers have had their applications rejected due to a fee increase. In other words, they were unable to explain why they needed to raise fees to be viable.

The ministry has also received inquiries from 90 childcare providers who do not currently have funding contracts with the province, and they have been provided with information about how to apply for grants and the fee-reduction initiative.

Minister of State for Child Care Katrina Chen said the ministry did not have a target for how many childcare operators it had expected to opt in, because the program is not mandatory. She said it has only been a few weeks since contracts were distributed, and she expects that more providers will join the program in the coming months.

“We would like to have everybody, but this is an optional program,” she said. “We respect providers’ decisions.”

When asked if she would do anything differently, Chen said she believes things have gone well so far.