Ensuring Quality, Affordable Child Care: Mobilizing for Action

Abstract

In October 1990, Congress passed legislation authorizing two new major federal programs to subsidize child care for low- and moderate-income families and to improve the quality of care. The provisions were included in the Omnibus Budget Reconciliation Act of 1990,1 a multilayered funding and taxing measure enacted by Congress in the waning days of the 101st Congress. The battle to secure federal financial support for affordable, quality child care took nearly 20 years. The new law is significant, not just because it will provide hundreds of millions of federal dollars to help financially strapped families pay for child care, but because it represents an acknowledgment of the need for a federal child care policy. The legislation that ultimately passed, however, reflects a substantial compromise with the Act for Better Child Care (the "ABC bill") as it was originally drafted, particularly with respect to the provisions that address the aspects of child care concerned with quality. (The legislation was originally introduced in the 100th Congress as the Act for Better Child Care of 1987 by Senator Dodd (D-CT) and Rep Dale Kildee (D-MI). It was reintroduced in the 101th Congress (S 5/HR 30) but was folded into the Budget Reconciliation Act as Congress rushed to finish work on the bill and ensure its passage as part of the more comprehensive funding measure.) Proponents of the ABC bill had originally hoped that the legislation would include federal health and safety standards for child care providers. However, the Bush administration opposed federal standards, even provisions that would have required the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) to draft model standards that states would then be encouraged to use as guidelines.