U.S. Sen. Patrick Leahy, left, speaks with SVMC President and CEO Thomas Dee at Wednesday's announcement of funding for the hospital's child-care center.
SVMC President Thomas Dee addresses the gathering.
Aly Richards, chief executive officer of Let's Grow Kids, talks about the deficit of child-care spots around the state.
Leahy speaks with state Rep. Mary Morrissey, left, and Learning Tree Director Nancy Noel.
The senior senator, who was elected in 1975, did not say if he had decided yet to run for a ninth term in 2022.
BENNINGTON, Vt. — The Learning Tree has been providing child care for the employees of Southwestern Vermont Medical Center and the general public for more than two decades.
But the number of spots available in the facility on the hospital campus — and in the region — simply hasn't kept up with the need. The Bennington area is short more than 500 child-care slots.
"It's heartbreaking when you have to tell someone, no I'm sorry I have to put you on the waitlist because I don't have any slots," Director Nancy Noel on Wednesday.
Hopefully, in the next year or two, the 59 child-care openings at SVMC will nearly double thanks to $750,000 that U.S. Sen. Patrick Leahy set aside in the 2021 appropriations bill.
Leahy, chair of the Senate Appropriations Committee and president pro tempore, was in Bennington on Wednesday to stress the economic benefits of quality child-care for not just Vermonters but for the nation to mitigate the impacts from the pandemic.
"We know that most of the burden still falls [on women] and it's no surprise that women's labor force participation is at a 33-year low," he said. "We've struggled over decades to have equity in the workplace. That equity is only going to be possible if we make child-care affordable and accessible for all people. That should not be a Republican or Democratic issue — that should be an American issue."
The announcement was made Wednesday morning under a tent next to the Learning Tree's fenced-in playground on the hospital campus. Also attending were state Reps. David Durfee and Mary Morrissey, state Sen. Dick Sears and Bennington Town Manager Stuart Hurd.
Aly Richards, chief executive officer of Let's Grow Kids, a nonprofit dedicated to advocating for quality child-care that has partnered with the health-care system, said the accredited Learning Tree is "a high-quality child-care model of what all of our kids deserve to experience at this formative age in their lives."
Richards said investment was essential in developing child-care options and just as important as bridges and roads for a recovering economy. The need for child care was urgent and immediate, she stressed.
"Three out of five of Vermont's youngest kids before the pandemic did not have access to the child-care they needed," she said. "In Bennington, what does that mean: 555 additional child-care spaces and 132 initial early educators are going to be needed to meet the needs of families in this county alone. ...
"Those kids are missing out on opportunities that will literally set them up for a lifetime of success in school, in health, in relationships."
Let's Grow Kids is supporting H.171, a bill in the Vermont Legislature that would cap child-care costs at 10 percent of a family's income, strengthen the early childhood education workforce through scholarships and loan repayment plans, identify long-term funding sources and create an advisory committee on regulations and administration of the child-care network by 2025.
Leahy said local leaders are best positioned to understand the needs of their communities and that when he asked Thomas Dee, SVMC's president and CEO, what he needed in Bennington the answer was "boom, child care."
"Local leaders have a better understanding of the needs and opportunities in their community than a federal agency in D.C.," the ranking senator said. "Having been born and raised in Vermont, I know that we do not have a one size fits all. We've got to have the flexibility to decide what we need."
The funds are earmarked in Leahy's 2021 Congressionally Directed spending requests in the $2.3 million consolidated appropriations bill. Leahy said the bill's sections have been passing almost unanimously through the Appropriations Committee.
Leahy's earmarks also include $16.9 million for a new National Guard Readiness Center on Bowen Road and $2.1 million to add 2,000 acres in Pownal and Stamford to the Green Mountain National Forest, expanding public buffer land along the Appalachian and Long trails.
The Learning Tree got $60,000 grant from Let's Grow Kids in 2020 to add two new classrooms and 17 more slots, bringing the total up to 59. It serves children ages 6 weeks to 5 years old.
The center is planning to expand to 125 slots but there is no space within the current location to do that. Dee said officials are looking at alternatives locations or additions, and possibly the campus of the former Southern Vermont College. The health-care system purchased the closed campus last year and it is located across Monument Avenue from the hospital.
"We haven't made that final decision as to what site is most appropriate for our needs, both and we are looking to expand the number of service slots we have," he said. "So hopefully over the next few months we'll resolve the business planning on how we can do this."
Dee expected the funds to largely go to renovations but noted that child-care services are expensive and they would have to look into wage structures for recruitment and retention of staff as well as physical space.
Some parents wait up to two years until a spot can open, said Noel.
"[The funds] means eliminating the waitlist probably more than anything else," she said. "As long as we can also provide quality instructors to come along with us as well."
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