Today, President Barack Obama signed S.1086, the Child Care and Development Block Grant Act of 2014 into law.
The legislation most recently passed the United States Senate by a vote of 88-1 on Monday, November 17, 2014 following a multi-year process taking the bill through both the Senate and the House of Representatives. In June 2013, Senators Barbara Mikulski (D-MD), Richard Burr (R-NC), Lamar Alexander (R-TN), and Tom Harkin (D-IA) introduced S.1086, then titled the Child Care and Development Block Grant Act of 2013, a bill that would reauthorize the Child Care and Development Block Grant program for the first time in almost two decades, while including some baseline safety and quality measures.
S.1086 includes measures to:
- Promote quality child care by increasing state-level investments in activities to improve the quality of care, enhancing states’ ability to train providers and develop safer and more effective child care services.
- Strengthen health and safety requirements in child care programs and providers.
- Improve access to child care by expanding eligibility for participating families and helping families connect with quality programs that meet their needs
Later in 2013, in September, S.1086 passed out of the Senate Health, Education, Labor, and Pensions committee by an unanimous consent voice vote, sending the bill to the full Senate for consideration. In March of 2014, after days of debate and considering amendments (18 in total adopted), the Senate passed S.1086 by a vote of 96-2, sending the bill forward to the House of Representatives for consideration. After months of investigation, discussion, and negotiation, leaders on the House Education and the Workforce Committee and the Senate HELP Committee announced an agreement on an amended version of S.1086, which would pass the House of Representatives the following Monday, sending the bill back to the Senate for final consideration.
After experiencing procedural roadblocks in mid-September, preventing a potential unanimous consent agreement, the Senate moved forward to consideration of the amended S.1086 on November 13, 2014, passing a cloture vote by a 96-1 margin, setting up the final vote on Monday, November 17, 2014.
Helpful resources for understanding impact of CCDBG Reauthorization becoming law:
For more information on CCDBG Reauthorization: http://usa.childcareaware.org/public-policy/core-issues/ccdbg-reauthorization
As we continue to move forward assessing and analyzing the impact of S.1086 becoming law, stay tuned to Child Care Aware of America, as we will be providing frequent resources on the impact and implications of implementation.