Infant child care in California can now cost as much as a mortgage. The Child Care Resource and Referral Network says the average monthly cost was about $1,110 a month, as of 2014, up 7% from 2009. Meanwhile, Nevada County is in the second most expensive of four cost category ranges, or $13,000 to $15,000 a year. Rossnina Dort is the local Child Care Planning Council coordinator. She says many centers don’t offer such care because it requires more teachers and service providers…
click to listen to Rossnina Dort
So Dort says centers can’t make as much money to cover the higher costs of taking care of infants and toddlers. She says there’s also less certainty how long children of that age will stay around…
click to listen to Rossnina Dort
Dort says one such center had to close recently, due to low enrollment. But The Referral Network says the percent of a family’s income spent in Nevada County on infant care is below the state average, or between 15 and 20%. The state average is more than 20% for a family putting a newborn in a day care center. Dort says there is currently a shortage of 863 slots for infants and toddlers in the county for full-time working parents who are not eligible for subsidies.
Lourdes Vose
Thank you for bringing the cost of child care to the table. As the Subsidized Child Care Agency for Nevada and Sierra Counties Sierra Nevada Children's Services understands the importance of affordable childcare. This is why we assist income eligible families by providing subsidized childcare. We have been offering these services to families in our community since 1978.