Child care shortages have been an ongoing problem across Minnesota for several years and have been cited as a top concern of New Ulm officials for more than five years.

Last October, community stakeholders have begun working with members of the First Children’s Finance organization to develop community solutions to the crisis. The town hall meeting was held to present the findings, seek further community input and work toward solutions.

Teri Steckelberg and Amber English of the First Children’s Finance organization facilitated the town hall and began by presenting data about the current crisis.

Based on the data available FIrst Children’s Finance determined that within the New Ulm School District there is a need for 184 potential child care slots for children birth to age five. Of this 184, around 59 slots were for infant and toddler-age kids.

Staff photo by Clay Schult Based on data gather by the First Children’s Finance organization, there are 184 needed child care slots needed with the New Ulm School District. Of these 184 slots, 59 are for infants and toddlers.

Steckelberg said New Ulm has a higher than an average number of children under 5 who have both parents working. That state’s average is 76% but in New Ulm, it is 90%.

The unemployment rate in New Ulm is also lower than average. It means most people in the community are in the workforce, and this is exacerbating the day care shortage.

The average length of a day care provider’s service in Brown County is longer than the state average. On average providers have served for 17.15 years and the state average is 13.8 years. Steckelberg said many Brown County providers have been working for over 20 years and this means some are preparing to retire.

A survey question asked Brown County providers how long they plan to stay in the business. Around 39% plan to retire in the next three to five years, and 26% said they would leave the business within three years.

Steckelberg said with over half of providers planning to leave within the next five years, the community needed to look for a solution to recruit new providers.

Staff photo by Clay Schult Teri Steckelberg of First Children’s Finance summarizes her organizations involvment with communities in developing child care options.

The limited number of providers has already impacted families. Of those surveyed in Brown County, 53% said access to child care impacted their family planning. One parent was quoted on the survey and said their pregnancy was timed based on child care availability. Steckelberg said this was a common statement made in the communities around Minnesota.

Another issue was provider compensation. English presented the Brown County Market Rates for child care based on 2021 data. All data were presented at the 75th percentile, meaning 75% charged less than a certain price and 25% were charging more.

Around 75% of day care centers were charging under $180 per week for an infant or an annual rate of $9,360. The other 25% were charging above $180 a week. A toddler was $165 a week at the 75th percentile and $155 for preschool kids. A school-age kid at a center was $130 a week at the 75th percentile.

Family day care is charged less with 75% charging $150 or less for an infant and toddler. The 75th percentile of family daycares charged $145 a week for preschool-age children. Family day cares only charge a higher rate for school-age kids at $140 a week.

Later in the meeting, Brown County Daycare provider Lisa Schmitz suggested offering training for providers on how to set fair rates.

“The local family child care providers are not getting their true worth, and people can take advantage of that,” Schmitz said. “We want to have reasonable rates for all our families but we want to make sure our home-based family child care providers are being valued.”

Steckelberg agreed this was an excellent form of training and said First Children’s Finance would be thrilled to offer that kind of training.

“The hardest part is convincing those providers of their worth and that they should charge that,” she said.

All the data gather by First Children’s Finance to help the Rural Child Care Innovation develop achievable goals for solving the childcare crisis.

TOMORROW: Six goals presented at the town hall meeting address the child care crisis.