Defective though it is in countless ways, Ohio’s recently passed state operating budget, House Bill 96, which Gov. Mike DeWine signed July 1, does offer occasional bright spots.
Excellent example: The decision by Ohio’s House and then Senate-House budget conferees to allot $10 million for a new “Child Care Cred” program, to enable workers, their employers, and the state to share child-care costs.
As cleveland.com’s Laura Hancock reported, “Workers and businesses would each pay 40%, while the state [will cover] the remaining 20%. Participation is voluntary for employers, who may also choose to subsidize their employees’ share.”
The Child Care Cred program wasn’t in the version of the budget that DeWine proposed to the General Assembly on Feb. 11. House Republicans inserted it in their version of the budget, passed April 9. But Senate Republicans deleted the Child Care Cred plan from the budget rewrite they approved on June 11.
Luckily, House and Senate conferees saved the House’s Child Care Cred amendment by reinserting it into the budget. Then, on June 25, the House and Senate signed off on the full budget package, sending it to DeWine.
The state’s leading business lobby, the Ohio Chamber of Commerce, ardently supports the Child Care Cred initiative and helped persuade legislators to include it in the final version of the budget.
In May testimony to the Senate Finance Committee, a senior Ohio chamber executive, Rick Carfagna, a suburban Columbus Republican who served from 2017 to 2022 in Ohio’s House, called for inclusion in the budget of several measures to ease Ohio working parents’ access to child care, among them, Child Care Cred.
“Child care remains a key workforce participation barrier for Ohio parents and caregivers, who often make the difficult decision to disengage partially or completely from the labor market due to prohibitive costs or lack of availability,” he testified. “In an economic study … by the U.S. Chamber of Commerce Foundation, the direct financial impact to Ohio of insufficient child care coverage is $5.48 billion annually … [including] $1.52 billion in missed annual tax revenue, and $3.97 billion in child-care-related employee turnover and absenteeism costs to Ohio employers.”
Viewed that way, $10 million to help fix a $5.5 billion annual drag on Ohio’s economy is a bargain.
As passed by legislators and approved by DeWine, a working Ohioan with children, and his or her employer choosing to participate in the program, would each pay 40% of the cost of child care for an employee’s child; the state would cover the remaining 20%. Among other features, the budget permits an “employer [to] agree to contribute some or all of an employee’s share of child care costs.”
The program limits eligibility for the tax credit to employees with annual family income no greater than 400% of the Federal Poverty Level – currently, for a family of two, that’s $84,600. The Ohio Department of Children and Youth will administer the program.
The conference committee’s inclusion of the House’s Child Care Cred plan in the budget’s final version, and its approval by DeWine, is a welcome example of constructive legislation action on an issue critical to the many Ohio parents who work outside their families’ homes. It’s a positive move by a General Assembly that all too often focuses on political distractions.
That said, the two-year budget only funds Child Care Cred for one year — the fiscal year that ends June 30, 2026; the budget doesn’t fund Child Care Cred after that.
That means Ohio’s working parents and their employers, for their mutual benefit, and the state, in light of the steep financial penalty Ohio incurs as a result of its child care shortage, must seek to make Child Care Cred a permanent program.
About our editorials: Editorials express the view of the editorial board of cleveland.com and The Plain Dealer — the senior leadership and editorial-writing staff. As is traditional, editorials are unsigned and intended to be seen as the voice of the news organization.
Have something to say about this topic?
* Send a letter to the editor, which will be considered for print publication.
* Email general questions about our editorial board or comments or corrections on this editorial to Elizabeth Sullivan, director of opinion, at [email protected].
If you purchase a product or register for an account through a link on our site, we may receive compensation. By using this site, you consent to our User Agreement and agree that your clicks, interactions, and personal information may be collected, recorded, and/or stored by us and social media and other third-party partners in accordance with our Privacy Policy.
