State to step up access to child care
Governor says state will set up new platform to help locate providers
PROVIDENCE – Gov. Gina 0. Raimondo on Tuesday announced a first-in-thenation partnership between the state and Care.com, an international online platform that would provide 5hode Island’s workers access to child care and elder care during the coronavirus COVID-19 pandemic.
“The reality is a lot of people are still working because they have to work,” Raimondo said during her daily press briefing. “First responders, those of us fighting the crisis on the front lines in the public sector, doctors, nurses, healthcare workers, elder care workers, and many of these folks are parents. :e also have many, many thousands of people working from home and in order to be productive working from home, you often need a babysitter or someone to watch your elderly loved one.”
“As I have said so many times, and I will continue to say, I want to do everything we can to maintain some semblance of an economy until the point in time, which I hope is soon, that we can start turning the economy back on,” the governor continued. “Child care and elder care provisions is one such provision that we
have to make so that folks can continue to work and their kids and loved ones are safe.”
The partnership with Care. com makes Rhode Island the first state in the country to partner with the online platform to help the state’s workers access child care and elder care. Raimondo explained that Care.com has agreed to provide 90 days of “free premium service.”
“Care.com has created a new website specifically for the people of Rhode Island such that, starting today, anyone in Rhode Island looking for child care or elder care can visit Care.com RIneed and you can look for a babysitter, child care provider, elder care provider,” the governor explained.
For some who find themselves recently out of work – physical therapists, waitresses, or child care workers, for example – this could be a way to earn a little money, Raimondo said, as a way to be matched up with a person in need of care and to offer services.
“I realize this is very imperfect, but it’s a way to make a little bit of money in the next couple of weeks as we get through this,” Raimondo said.
In an emailed statement, Care.com CEO Tim Allen said: “We applaud Governor Raimondo and the state of Rhode Island for taking such proactive measures in support of the essential frontline workers battling this pandemic. Care.com is honored to partner with them and we hope other municipalities will follow their lead. We stand at the ready to provide whatever help we can.”
Raimondo on Tuesday also announced several child care facilities that the state was working with to stay open during the crisis – the Boys and Girls Club, the Greater
Providence “All of these will offer onsite child care for children of essential hospital workers « These are center-based child care facilities and the Department of Human Services will be matching those facilities up with hospitals to make sure that the healthcare workers in those hospitals have some safe place to bring their children in the morning or in the evening while they are at work,” Raimondo explained. The Rhode Island Department of Human Services promulgated emergency regulations for Rhode Island child care providers that opt to remain open during the coronavirus crisis. To the extent possible, child care facilities must operate under three mandatory conditions: child care must be carried out in stable groups of 10 or fewer children shall not change from one group to another and if more than one group of children is cared for at one facility, each group shall be in a separate room. “DHS will be strictly enforcing the new guidelines, including by making surprise visits to child care centers just to make sure the rules are being followed,” Raimondo said. “I want to emphasize again, I know this is hard, I know every solution that I am putting out there is imperfect. We are trying every day to do the best we can to meet the needs of this crisis and our response is incremental and will continue to improve.” The state’s number of confirmed coronavirus cases climbed by 18 on Tuesday to 124 total. Rhode Island Department of Health Director Nicole Alexander-Scott emphasized that while the state’s vulnerable populations of seniors and those with underlying illnesses are most at risk, this is a virus that is not discriminating based on age or pre-existing conditions. “With the cases we are seeing, which we have been anticipating and we are evaluating, they are from all ages. We’re seeing men and women, adults of all ages,” Alexander-Scott said. “And so it is critical that everyone follows these instructions. We certainly have the focus on our vulnerable population but we need to make sure our 20-year-olds and our 30-year-olds and our 40-year-olds are also listening, because the virus does not pick and choose who to infect.” Alexander-Scott additionally said that she and the Health Department were beginning to see more association with domestic travel than from international travel relating to the confirmed cases, saying it was “important to follow the quarantining instructions that the governor announced” on Monday, that anyone who has returned from any flight must be quarantined for a minimum of 14 days. Raimondo on Tuesday also said that leaders from the House and Senate will convene Thursday to consider a proposal from her that would borrow emergency funding for the state’s response to the COVID-19 pandemic. The Disaster Emergency Funding Board, a body consisting of the House Speaker, Senate President, and chairs of the House and Senate Finance Committees, will meet Thursday morning, after Raimondo requested that the board meet to approve the borrowing of 300 million from the federal government or other sources to fund the coronavirus response. 8nder the state law establishing the board, the state can borrow such emergency funding with a repayment period of up to two years.