Voices for Utah Children Articles
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How to Get Help Paying for Child Care in Utah
Finding and affording quality child care is a challenge for many families in Utah. Fortunately, there are several programs designed to help, and the Child Care Assistance Program (CCAP) is the most widely available and impactful. Apply for Child Care...
- Type: Article
- Author: Jenna Williams
- Category: Updates & Blog
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What Happened With Child Care During the 2025 Legislative Session?
This 2025 session, supporting families with young children remained a top policy priority of Voices for Utah Children. The urgent need to address families' critical child care needs remained at the forefront of our advocacy efforts. This session was...
- Type: Article
- Author: Jenna Williams
- Category: Updates & Blog
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Utah Has a New Plan to Fix Childcare
There’s a bright spot of news in the childcare advocacy world this week! The Women in the Economy Subcommittee of the Governor’s Unified Economic Opportunity Commission recently released a new 84-page plan to address the childcare crisis in Utah. The...
- Type: Article
- Author: Anna Thomas
- Category: Updates & Blog
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How the Kentucky Model Would Help Utah’s Child Care Providers Help More Kids
This year, the Utah State Legislature passed House Bill 461 with overwhelming support. Sponsored by Rep. Ashlee Matthews and Sen. Luz Escamilla, HB 461 aims to recruit and retain more child care professionals using the “Kentucky Model.” This model...
- Type: Article
- Author: Jenna Williams
- Category: Updates & Blog
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Promising Child Care Bill Faces Roadblock in Agency Implementation
Our childcare system has been in crisis for years. Families can't afford to pay, and costs keep climbing. Childcare providers struggle to make a living, with only their passion for kids to keep them going. So, what is the state government going to do...
- Type: Article
- Author: Jenna Williams, Anna Thomas
- Category: Updates & Blog
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Utah Child Care Affordability Calculator
In Utah, raising a family with children is expensive. Whether or not a family can afford child care depends on income remaining after paying basic household expenses. To help policymakers understand these challenges, we're introducing the Utah Child...
- Type: Article
- Author: Jenna Williams
- Category: Updates & Blog
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What Happened With Child Care During the 2024 Legislative Session?
As we entered the 2024 session, supporting families with young children remained a top policy priority of Voices for Utah Children. At the forefront of our advocacy efforts is the urgent need to address the critical child care needs of these families....
- Type: Article
- Author: Jenna Williams
- Category: Updates & Blog
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FAQs on HB 153: Child Care Revisions
Representative Susan Pulsipher’s HB 153: Child Care Revisions narrowly passed the Utah State Legislature on February 28, 2024, and was signed by the Governor on March 14, 2024. Initially proposed as a child tax credit expansion initiative, HB 153 has...
- Type: Article
- Author: Anna Thomas
- Category: Updates & Blog
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Oppose HB 153: Child Care Revisions - Protect Kids in Care!
Representative Susan Pulsipher’s HB 153 was initially aimed at providing tax relief for families with young children through an expanded state child tax credit. Originally, the bill aimed to extend the child tax credit eligibility from ages one to...
- Type: Article
- Author: Jenna Williams
- Category: Updates & Blog
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Child Care for Utah's Future: A Call to Action for Elected Officials
This open letter was released on January 31, 2024, by Neighborhood House and Voices for Utah Children, two non-profit organizations working together with other community partners to create a better childcare system in Utah for the benefit of all the...
- Type: Article
- Author: Anna Thomas
- Category: Updates & Blog
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Mapping Care for Kids: A County-Level Look at Utah’s Crisis in Licensed Child Care
Utah’s family demographics have changed. 53% of Utah families have all available parents in the workforce, making child care a necessity. These days, most Utah families need two incomes to maintain financial stability. But Utah’s licensed child care...
- Type: Article
- Author: Jenna Williams
- Category: Updates & Blog
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It’s Official: Access to Licensed Child Care Statewide is Really Bad (and Getting Worse)
We know that Utah’s child care crisis is bad, and is going to get worse. New data helps illustrate exactly how bad the situation is, in each county across the state. Next week Voices for Utah Children will release a report titled, “Mapping Care for...
- Type: Article
- Author: Jenna Williams
- Category: Updates & Blog
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What Happened with Child Care During the 2023 Legislative Session?
Child care certainly received its fair share of discussion this legislative session, but did anything really happen? The short answer is kinda. Here’s what happened. Funding Requests During the session, Voices for Utah Children teamed up with parents,...
- Type: Article
- Author: Jenna Williams
- Category: Updates & Blog
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Utah's Child Care Crisis is About to Hit a Whole New Level
Since the start of the pandemic, Utah has received nearly $600 million in emergency federal funding to ensure that our child care sector can continue to serve families despite nearly overwhelming COVID-era challenges. In one year, at the end of...
- Type: Article
- Author: Anna Thomas
- Category: Updates & Blog
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Let's Just Say It: Child Care is School, and School is Child Care.
For years, advocates (like me) have avoided mentioning the fact – at least, in the presence of legislators – that Utah families rely on school not just for education, but also for reliable and high quality child care. Similarly, until very recently,...
- Type: Article
- Author: Anna Thomas
- Category: Updates & Blog
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Investing in Early Care and Education Professionals Will Strengthen Utah Child Care
Utah leaders should be investing in child care professionals through paid training and educational opportunities, refundable tax credits for people who provide care and learning opportunities directly to young children, and other direct incentives that...
- Type: Article
- Author: Anna Thomas
- Category: Updates & Blog
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There’s No “Re-Opening” Utah Without More Child Care
Child care is arguably one of the biggest areas of economic weakness exposed by the COVID-19 pandemic and related economic crisis. For Utah, a new and better approach is necessary and within reach. Even before the pandemic forced statewide shutdowns in...
- Type: Article
- Author: Anna Thomas
- Category: Updates & Blog
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National Orgs Call for Emergency Child Care Sector Relief
Child care in Utah has always been critical to our state's economic health - and to the health, safety and well-being of the children of working families. In the current emergency situation, the preservation and support of this sector is even more...
- Type: Article
- Author: Anna Thomas
- Category: Updates & Blog
