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Resource Collection: Maximizing Federal Relief Funds

These resources provide state leaders with information on the funding available through 2020-2021 Federal Relief Programs and strategies for maximizing opportunities.

States, counties, cities, communities, and schools currently have significant opportunities to rethink supports for young children and their families through three federal relief and stimulus packages: the CARES Act, signed in March 2020, CRRSA (the Coronavirus Response and Relief Supplemental Appropriates Act) signed in December 2020, and ARPA (the American Rescue Plan Act of 2021) signed in March 2021. With these three pieces of legislation, the federal government has earmarked $50 billion for child care alone.

Our country faced devastating child care challenges pre-pandemic, which the crisis only exacerbated, but this investment offers leaders a chance to reinvent, rebuild, and create a system of early care and education centered on families, especially those who have been marginalized by racism, and with the potential to reward providers with significantly enhanced compensation and benefits.

This collection of resources provides a primer on what is covered by the legislation and presents a wide range of current thinking on how best to maximize the historic opportunities created by these relief and stimulus packages.

Advancing Equity in Early Care and Education System with The American Rescue Plan Act

Report June 1, 2021

This policy agenda attends to critical levers to ensure equitable access, positive experiences, and outcomes that are not associated with demographic characteristics in learning systems for our youngest children and their families. The American Rescue Plan provides a unique opportunity to make tangible headway on this agenda. The report also reviews concrete ways to invest in ensuring equitable access, experiences, and outcomes and can be a tool to support states and tribes in building a pathway towards stronger, higher-quality, more equitable systems.

Overview for America’s Counties: U.S. Treasury Interim Final Rule & Guidance for State and Local Fiscal Recovery Funds

Article May 24, 2021

From the National Association of Counties, this web article collects information on the interim final rule and guidance for the $362 billion Coronavirus State and Local Fiscal Recovery Fund, established under the American Rescue Plan Act. Released by the U.S. Department of Treasury in May 2021, the material includes a fact sheet and Frequently Asked Questions.

Six Opportunities to Advance Equity in the ARPA Child Care Stabilization Grant Guidance

Blog May 18, 2021

The grant guidance for the American Rescue Plan Act offers strategies for designing stabilization grant programs that can begin to address systemic inequities built into the child care industry over centuries and rooted in historic reliance on the undervalued work of Black, Latinx, and other women of color. This article, prepared by the Center for Law and Social Policy, offers are six important opportunities states should consider as they use ARPA funds to meet the field’s immediate relief needs.

Optimizing Distribution of American Rescue Plan Funds to Stabilize Child Care

Article May 17, 2021

This issue brief, prepared by The Center for American Progress, details how states can partner with community-based child care intermediary organizations to distribute the $24 billion in the child care relief and stabilization fund. The brief includes a table showing how much each state will receive in child care relief and stabilization funding as part of the total child care funding included in the American Rescue Plan.

How States Can Improve Child Care Facilities and Physical Spaces Using Federal Relief Dollars

Article May 1, 2021

With more than $50 billion in federal relief invested in the child care sector, along with additional resources for states and localities to respond to the pandemic, states have unprecedented opportunities to create a more equitable, sustainable, comprehensive early care and education system. While investments in the workforce are the most important driver of child care quality and supply, facilities are a key element of creating a high-quality child care experience in centers and family child care homes. However thin operating margins and decades of public underfunding have left many child care providers with limited resource to improve their facility infrastructure, a reality disproportionately and inequitably experienced by providers in communities of color. This article developed jointly by NAEYC, CLASP, EdCounsel, NAFCC and NCFN, profiles funding streams and offers strategies that states, territories and tribes can consider improving child care facilities and physical spaces.

Information Memorandum ARP Act Child Care Stabilization Funds

Government Document May 1, 2021

This document from the Administration for Children and Families, Department of Health and Human Services provides an overview and guidance on the child care stabilization grants made available through the American Rescue Plan (ARP) Act.

Three Principles for an Antiracist, Equitable State Response to COVID 19 – and a Stronger Recovery

Report April 29, 2021

COVID-19’s effects have underscored the ways our nation’s history of racism, bias, and discrimination are embedded in our health, social, and economic systems. But recent, substantial federal aid and an improving revenue outlook in many states are offering states a historic chance: they can make policy choices that repeat and exacerbate these inequities, which also will slow the economy’s recovery, or they can set another course — toward antiracist, equitable, and inclusive policies that build an economic recovery that extends to all people. This article from the Center on Budget and Policy Priorities provides three principles to guide the recovery work.

Three Steps State Child Care Agencies Can Take to Support an Equitable Economic Recovery

Blog March 4, 2021

During the COVID-19 pandemic, parents have had to balance working or seeking work, protecting their own and their children’s health and safety, and managing their children’s education despite child care programs being closed or offering reduced services. For Black and Latino families, these challenges have been more pronounced. This Urban Institute blog outlines three immediate ways policymakers can use the child care funds allocated in the recent relief packages to more equitably support families with young children.