Boulder County’s childcare funding freeze leaves families and teen parents struggling to stay in school and work

When April Morales had her daughter in 2023, just before her junior year at Arapahoe Ridge High School, it fueled her desire to achieve more in life.

Morales maintained strong grades, enrolled in a construction class at the Boulder Technical Education Center and planned to start business courses at Front Range Community College during her senior year. Her goal was to attend college and pursue a career as an architect and business owner.

But last spring, she lost childcare funding for her now one-year-old daughter. Instead of attending her senior year, Morales now stays home and cares for her child.

“I want to study. I want to have a degree. I want to graduate,” Morales told Boulder Reporting Lab. “I had a goal set for my life, and I feel like this kind of ruined them.”

After her daughter’s birth, Morales relied on Colorado’s Child Care Assistance Program (CCAP) to cover most daycare costs, allowing the 17-year-old to focus on school and her future. But a simple mistake on her paperwork and a missed email in January led to her CCAP benefits being canceled. Previously, she could have re-enrolled, but in March 2024, Boulder County indefinitely froze new applications to the program, leaving Morales and other parents without options. Without this assistance, childcare costs Morales nearly $6,000 per semester.

“For many of our clients, they can’t go to school now because they can’t get CCAP,” said Mary Faltynski, a coordinator for Boulder County’s Genesis program, which supports teen parents. She explained that once teens drop out of high school, it’s rare for them to return.

For Morales, a simple error had major consequences. She had mistakenly reported no income instead of listing her parents’ income, which the county later told her was required. “I’m a first-time mom. I’m a teen mom. Nobody helped me,” Morales said. “They couldn’t call and say, ‘Hey, list your parents’ income?’ Instead, they just took it away.”

Faltynski asked the county to make exceptions to the freeze for teens like Morales, but officials said there wasn’t enough funding.

“It doesn’t suck being a teen mom,” Morales said. “It sucks just having to pause everything because you can’t find childcare.” 

‘Our spending isn’t sustainable’

The Colorado Child Care Assistance Program was established in the late 1990s to manage federal funding from the 1990 Child Care & Development Block Grant. Today, it’s still largely funded by that federal block grant, overseen by the state and administered by counties. 

In the last fiscal year, Colorado’s CCAP assisted nearly 26,000 children, including about 1,800 in Boulder County. The state estimates it serves just over a quarter of eligible children in need, while Boulder County serves slightly more than half — an increase from previous years. In 2021, Colorado received an additional $286.2 million in federal childcare stabilization funds through the American Rescue Plan Act, allowing counties to expand services.

When this federal stimulus expired on Sept. 30, counties were left scrambling. Boulder County’s CCAP funding for the upcoming fiscal year was cut by more than half a million dollars to $8.6 million, largely due to the loss of this stimulus.

“At this rate, our spending isn’t sustainable,” Jim Williams, communications specialist for Boulder County’s Health and Human Services Department, told Boulder Reporting Lab. He said the freeze will remain until the county can balance the budget and stabilize the program.

During this freeze, families already on CCAP will continue to receive assistance, but the county won’t accept new participants. Boulder County was the second in Colorado to impose a freeze, following Larimer County, with Adams soon after. Other counties, including Douglas, Jefferson and Gunnison, have implemented waitlists, also preventing new applicants. Sarah Dawson, director of CCAP, expects more counties to follow, particularly as new federal rules increase program costs.

These new rules, part of President Biden’s 2023 Executive Order on Care, cap childcare costs for low-income families at 7% of income and require states to pay providers based on enrollment rather than attendance. States must also cover the true cost of care. Between the loss of stimulus funding and these new rules — which will require the state to pay an additional $20.4 million to providers — Dawson estimates Colorado will serve 22% fewer children by August 2026, when the rules fully take effect.

“Making it more affordable for families, really trying to stabilize the childcare sector, paying providers the actual cost of care — those are all really good things,” Dawson said of the rules. “The problem is, it didn’t come with any additional money.”

Boulder County is expected to feel the strain more than others, as it has long relied on surplus state funds to cover CCAP overspending. “Boulder County’s overspending has helped serve the maximum number of families and children in our county,” Williams, with the county, said. Dawson praised their effort.

In the past, surplus funds came from counties unable to use their full CCAP allocations, often due to a shortage of childcare providers. But with rising costs and the loss of stimulus funding, those counties are unlikely to have surplus funds going forward.

‘No way to move forward’

Despite the freezes, a limited number of Colorado families can still enroll in CCAP. Federal guidelines require counties to continue serving families on Colorado Works, Colorado’s TANF program, which provides low-income families with cash payments and support for schooling, training and jobs. Children in the child welfare system can also still enroll.

But this still leaves many parents, like Morales, who don’t qualify for either program, without the childcare they need.

Even parents who qualify for TANF face barriers. Lisa Sweeney-Miran, who runs Haven Ridge, a homeless shelter for women and mothers, said strict eligibility requirements and time limits on TANF make it difficult for families. “We have clients who used TANF benefits a decade ago – got a full time job, got an apartment, had everything going well. And then, for example, the spouse they were living with turned abusive and it brought them right back to square one,” she said. “So now they’re back with us 10 years later, having another baby, having used up all of their TANF benefits.” 

Without TANF, these parents can’t access CCAP during the freeze, leaving them “no way to move forward,” Sweeney-Miran said, though she noted that Haven Ridge pays for childcare for the parents they assist. 

Dawson doesn’t expect any movement on federal funding for CCAP until at least after the presidential election. She sympathizes with both the affected families and the county workers tasked with delivering the difficult news.

“I really feel for those county workers that are going to have to work with families and say, ‘I know you need this care and I’m so sorry there’s not money, even though you’re eligible,’” she said.