This November, voters in Garfield, Pitkin, and southwest Eagle counties will decide whether or not to approve a sales tax to fund child care in the region.
Measure 7A would establish a special tax district governed by a five-member board of directors to oversee and allocate sales tax revenue. Voters will elect those five board members on the same ballot this November in case 7A passes.
For the nine candidates, a seat on the child care district board is an opportunity to help shape a first-of-its kind solution to the region’s child care crisis — not only for the Roaring Fork and Colorado River Valleys, but for the entire state of Colorado, and the U.S. a whole.
If 7A passes, it would be the first special taxing district devoted to child care in the country.
Jasmin Ramirez is running for Seat 2 on the board to represent New Castle, Glenwood Springs, and Carbondale.
A mom of two, a Glenwood Springs High School graduate and a former preschool teacher, Ramirez currently serves on the state’s early childhood leadership commission. She’s also a board member for the Colorado Statewide Parent Coalition and serves on the Roaring Fork School District Board of Education.
Ramirez said one of her priorities for the district would be paying child care workers a living wage. The child care industry is among the lowest paid occupations in the country according to the Hechinger Report. In the Parachute to Aspen corridor, the median wage of a lead day care provider is $24 per hour.
“I've heard it across the entire state of Colorado,” said Ramirez. “It is really hard to not just get people to be interested in becoming an early childhood provider, but also to make it affordable to live in a community that is so expensive.”
Increasing the number of child care spots is another goal for 7A. Less than half of children under 5 years old in the Aspen to Parachute corridor are currently enrolled in licensed child care facilities, according to data from Confluence Early Childhood Education Coalition, the nonprofit that lobbied to put the tax district on the ballot. In the Colorado River Valley, it’s even less, with just 29% of kids under 5 years old enrolled.
Claudia Flores Cruz, a candidate for Seat 1, which would represent the Parachute and Rifle area, is a mom to two teenagers and a coordinator for Garfield County School District 16’s Family Resource Center.
She noted that the lack of child care access downvalley affects the entire region since more than half of Parachute’s population works in communities upvalley. Meanwhile, the town does not have a child care center.
“My hope is that if this passes, it could potentially inspire business owners to create their new child care center, knowing that there's some funding to support them along the way.”
Her other goal: to boost awareness about the importance of preschool among Latino families, because early childhood education has unique benefits.
“My daughter got a screening for speech delay in her preschool years, and then my son was bilingual and could read in both languages by the time he was 5.”
Without preschool, her kids would not have had those advantages, said Flores Cruz, since she was working, and her mother, who provided childcare, had limited English.
For Flores Cruz, the child care district is about making early childhood education more accessible to all families, not just those who can afford it.
“This may not be the solution that fixes all of our child care needs,” she said. “But at least we're trying something.”
