Maine Kids VOICE

Last week, the Maine Children’s Alliance and other education groups testified in support of LD 1530 - An Act to Establish a Process for the Implementation of Universal Voluntary Prekindergarten Education. The Maine Children’s Alliance supports high quality universal prekindergarten that is:

• Well-integrated with quality Head Start and child care providers in the community,
• Well-staffed with appropriately credentialed early childhood professionals
• Designed to especially serve low income families whose children disproportionately need these enriching opportunities
• Encouraging parent engagement and providing family support;
• Easily accessible even for families who cannot afford a car, and is
• Wrapped with a full day of quality care so that working parents know their children are safe and well throughout the day while they work.

In addition, MCA believes that creating a universal pre-K system for four year olds must not be done in isolation from the rest of the state’s early childhood system.

To access MCA’s full testimony, click here.

The following statement was made by Mary Henderson (MCA’s Senior Policy Analyst) during a press conference regarding the restoration of state funds to Head Start, Child Care Subsidies & Home Visiting.

Whether Maine will have a prosperous future depends in large part on our ability to raise strong, bright, compassionate children who can serve tomorrow’s communities. They must be better at critical thinking, creative problem solving, calm negotiating, careful analyzing and life long learning than earlier generations if they are to rise to the challenges of the future and our interconnected world. And if we expect solid outputs, we have to invest in solid inputs.

The good news is that the latest science tells us exactly how to invest – we must help parents to provide young children, beginning right at birth, with healthy, nurturing experiences that literally build the brain’s architecture. This “brain building” happens through frequent, engaging and guided interactions with caring adults and the world around them.

Evidence in Maine indicates we must make better and smarter investments in our children. In 2011, 30% of Maine fourth grade children could not read at a basic level; 68% – over two-thirds — were not proficient readers.[1] Of these non-proficient fourth graders, the data predicts that 16% of them will not graduate from high school on time. If they lived in poverty for at least a year, one-in-four will not graduate from high school on time.[2] And these days in Maine, almost a fifth of our children are living in poverty. All in all, this does not bode well for the future of thousands of our children or for the future of Maine’s communities unless we invest now.

Assisted by the Fund for a Healthy Maine, Maine over the years has been stretching its federal grants to patch together early childhood programs that respond to the science of brain development. Maine Families Home Visiting and Early Head Start programs have been targeting families with infants and toddlers to screen and catch developmental delays early. They help parents learn how to promote healthy development and how to protect children from toxic stress that can derail development. In the private sector, licensed child care centers are voluntarily upgrading their standards to meet established statewide quality rating standards. Child development professionals dream of a future when unlicensed family and friend providers can receive basic information in the science of child development and licensed providers and pre-kindergarten teachers are adequately credentialed and paid a reasonable wage so that turnover can be reduced.

But recently the progress has been deferred. Instead, huge state budget cuts have caused staff to be laid off, classrooms to go empty, children at risk to go undetected, and working families to go without affordable, quality child care. Since 2011 over $9 million dollars – about two-thirds of our state’s investment in early childhood programs has been cut.

• Maine Families Home Visiting was cut entirely from the Fund for a Healthy Maine between 2011 and 2013 – to the tune of $4.9 million.
• Early Head Start was cut in 2012 by over $2 million in the General Fund.
• Child Care subsidies – vouchers that help low income parents afford child care so they can go to work – was cut by $1.97 million dollars in 2012, which will cause the state to lose an additional $3 million per year in federal block grant dollars.

We are here to support two bills that would restore the worst of these budget cuts. LD 517 would restore the lost Head Start dollars. LD 1383 does that and restores dollars to Home Visiting, subsidized child care,  and contains provisions designed to put us back on track to improving early childhood education for young children and families.

These days our economy pushes more and more parents to rely on child care providers to care for their children while they work. In Maine, 66% of families with children under age 6 have every parent in the household working. This is a challenge, but also an opportunity to invest in Maine’s children while their brains are in those critical early years of development, when the return on that investment is huge. We urge the legislature and the Governor to “pay it forward” – restore our investments in early childhood. It will change the trajectory of childrens’ lives and offer a better future for the state.

The Maine Children’s Alliance is now accepting nominations for the 19^th annual Giraffe Awards, given to those who “stick their necks out for kids.”

Since 1995, MCA has recognized those who do extraordinary work on behalf of children in communities all over Maine. The annual Giraffe Awards program has been so successful in calling attention to the achievements of dedicated volunteers, professionals and organizations that MCA has adopted the giraffe as its symbol for its ongoing efforts to “stick our necks out” to improve the well-being of children, youth and families in Maine.

2012 Giraffe Award Winners

This event celebrates the tremendous contributions of individuals, organizations, and businesses in Maine that have worked to improve the lives of our children. (Access information about 2012 winners here.)

The Giraffe Awards recognize winners in different categories including: outstanding individual award, youth award, business award and organization award. Past winners have included people working in children’s mental health, youth camps, Maine businesses that have been generous to young people, volunteers, educators and many more.

The Champions for Children Event provides an opportunity for the Maine community to say “thank you” to people who have sacrificed and have invested time, energy, talent, and grit to help our children.

This year’s event is scheduled for Thursday,  October 3rd,  at the Freeport Hilton Garden Inn.

For more information and nomination form, click here.

You may also call (207) 623-1868 ext. 207 or email tstevens@mekids.org

All nominations must be received by May 31, 2013 

Giraffe Award Nomination form

TESTIMONY OF NED MCCANN, MAINE CHILDREN’S ALLIANCE

Before the Joint Standing Committees on Appropriations and Financial Affairs and

Health and Human Services on the Biennial Budget

March 27, 2013

Good afternoon. Senator Hill and Representative Rotundo, Senator Craven and Representative Farnsworth, and members of the Joint Standing Committees on Appropriations and Financial Affairs and members of the Health and Human Services, my name is Ned McCann. I am the Executive Director of the Maine Children’s Alliance. Thank you for the opportunity to appear before you this afternoon.

The Maine Children’s Alliance is a statewide non-partisan, non-profit research and advocacy organization whose mission is to promote sound public policies to improve the lives of children, youth, and families in Maine. I am also speaking today on behalf of the Start ME Right Coalition, a group of early childhood experts and advocates devoted to improving early childhood health and education.

Our interest today is not to respond to specific items in the Biennial Budget that are immediately before you. Rather, we are speaking today about what is missing from this budget—the restoration of previous cuts to the three pillars of early childhood efforts in Maine–Child Care, Home Visiting, and Head Start.

Legislation is currently pending in the Health and Human Services Committee to restore critical funding to these programs. One bill focused upon Head Start, sponsored by Senator Tuttle and co-sponsored by Representative Fredette, had its hearing postponed due to weather last week. Another bill to address Home Visiting, child care, and Head Start sponsored by Representative Berry is not yet printed, to my knowledge. The Maine Children’s Alliance and the Start ME Right Coalition want to highlight these bills and their importance to your deliberations prior to the conclusion of your work on this portion of the biennial budget.

In a press release accompanying the State’s “Race to the Top” application to the U.S. Department of Education, Governor LePage stated, “Guaranteeing children a solid educational foundation before they begin kindergarten is the first crucial investment we as a state can make in a future work force that will drive economic growth in Maine.” This sentiment has been echoed by the Maine State Chamber of Commerce and the Maine Development Foundation in a report last year entitled “Making Maine Work: Investment in Young Children = Real Economic Development.” The same sound thinking has been expressed by the Maine Early Learning Investment Group, a group of CEO’s in Maine who understand the vital importance of early childhood education to workforce development and economic health. Others groups like America’s Edge, Mission Readiness, and Fight Crime: Invest in Kids–business, military, and law enforcement groups also highly value early childhood investments.

Yet our funding decisions in recent years have moved us in the wrong direction. In charts that accompany my testimony, you can note that, between the Fund for a Healthy Maine and the General Fund, we have reduced funding to home visiting, child care, and head start by 48% over the last three years, from nearly $19 million to just under $10 million.

Compounding the problems with this state action, Head Start in Maine is also being reduced as a result of the federal sequestration, another hit of $1.6 million.

We are moving in the wrong direction. My mission today is to implore you to re-establish funding for early childhood as a very high priority for the State of Maine. Thousands of Maine children and families, as well as our economic future, depend upon it.

Thank you for your time today. I am happy to try to answer any questions you may have, and look forward to seeing the members of the Health and Human Services Committee soon on legislation yet to be heard.

TESTIMONY OF MARY HENDERSON,
MAINE CHILDREN’S ALLIANCE
Before the Joint Standing Committees on Appropriations and Financial Affairs and Health and Human Services
on the Biennial Budget

March 28, 2013

Good afternoon. Senator Hill and Representative Rotundo, Senator Craven and Representative Farnsworth, and members of the Joint Standing Committees on Appropriations and Financial Affairs and members of the Health and Human Services, my name is Mary Henderson. I am a Senior Policy Analyst at the Maine Children’s Alliance. Thank you for the opportunity to appear before you this afternoon.

The Maine Children’s Alliance is a statewide non-partisan, non-profit research and advocacy organization whose mission is to promote sound public policies to improve the lives of children, youth, and families in Maine.

I am here to strongly oppose those budget cuts to General Assistance that have the effect of directly or indirectly denying this assistance of the last resort to people who are unable to meet their basic needs – particularly families with children.

I hope that in considering these cuts, you will think more broadly about how Maine’s safety net for children ought to be constructed, where it is failing, and where it must be reconstructed. Taken in that broader context, these cuts to General Assistance — particularly the denial of General Assistance to children who have reached their 60 month time limit — are comparable to refusing life guard when the child has already fallen through the safety net and begun to drown.

If we lived in a society with no unemployment problem, where every parent, regardless of educational status, could find a job that paid well enough to cover child care, housing, utilities, health care, food, transportation and other basic needs, and where there were no chronic health problems or brain disorders that caused adults or children to be prone to addictions or mental illness or learning disabilities, and, of course, no domestic violence, then our safety net would not have to be so robust.

But once we accept the fact that we need a safety net that assists families with children, the question is what should that safety net look like? Clearly it must pay for the life guard to help rescue and stabilize families with children that are drowning.  It needs foster care, although that is not anyone’s preferred approach. And to help avoid foster care, the safety net needs a strong General Assistance program that is able to respond expertly when there is a need. But we do not want General Assistance and foster care to become the primary safety net features. The safety net must catch children before they are traumatized or seriously set back by family break-ups, malnutrition, homelessness, multiple changes in schools, chronic stress or other adverse consequences of extreme poverty. Research has shown that these experiences often have long lasting consequences for children and for society. Rather, the safety net must provide adequate support early on when families find themselves unable to meet their basic needs. It must contribute to stability and security for children so children can grow and learn, while their parents focus on improving their situation rather than attempt to juggle compounding disasters.

TANF has been our nation’s key safety net for children in poverty.  We know from a 2010 study of Maine TANF families by researchers at the University of New England and the University of Maine at Orono that families on TANF, having typically held three different jobs within the past five years, have many barriers to work. Two-thirds of all households have a member with a disability, and for families receiving assistance for more than five years in the 2010 study, 90% had a member with a disability.[1] This is similar to the national experience as well. [2] TANF does not serve most children in poverty. It serves those in extreme poverty. It served about 8% of Maine’s children during the recession, even as poverty rates for Maine’s children grew from 15.7% to over 19% during that period.

According to the Annie E. Casey Foundation’s (AECF) new KIDS COUNT Data Snapshot: Reducing Youth Incarceration in the United States, the rate of young people in correctional facilities in Maine on a single day fell to 142 per 100,000 youth in 2010, down from 219 per 100,000 in 1997.

The decline in youth confinement over the past decade has occurred in states in every region of the country. In fact, 44 states and the District of Columbia experienced a decline in the rate of young people confined since 1997 (see Figure 1). Still, the United States incarcerates far too many youth, leading the industrialized world in the rate at which we lock up young people.

The Annie E. Casey Foundation’s work-including the Juvenile Detention Alternatives Initiative (JDAI) and their recent publication, No Place for Kids: The Case for Reducing Juvenile Incarceration- recommends approaches that can improve the chances of success for young people who become involved with the justice system. These include investing in alternatives that effectively supervise, sanction and treat youth in their homes and communities.

The decline in youth incarceration has not led to a surge in crime. On the contrary, juvenile crime has fallen sharply during the same time period that youth incarceration has dropped. In 1997, 12,741 Maine youth ages 10 to 17 were arrested, a rate of of 88.2 arrests per 1,000 youth. In 2010, 6,492 Maine youth ages 10 to 17 were arrested, a rate of 49.6 arrests per 1,000 youth.

By limiting incarceration to youth who pose a demonstrable risk, youth are treated more humanely, the government saves money, and the public is actually safer.

In Maine, the 2012 to 2014 Comprehensive Three Year Plan for Juvenile Justice and Delinquency Prevention guides the priorities of Maine’s Juvenile Justice Advisory Group (JJAG). The plan provides the framework for JJAG’s course of action in terms of funding priorities, research directions, and legislative policy. For example, in an effort to facilitate the diversion of juveniles out of the criminal justice system, the JJAG three-year plan supports the implementation of restorative practices, which consist of the accountability and reintegration of the juvenile offender, is victim focused, and repairs the harm done. The JJAG report also states that reduced funding will affect delinquency prevention and school programs.

To access the youth incarceration report and related materials, please visit MCA’s National KIDS COUNT web page.

The Maine Children’s Alliance is a member of the New England Consortium (NEC), a six-state collaborative of child research and policy organizations working to advance policies to reduce poverty and build opportunity for children and families. NEC members continue to educate our national leaders and the public about the devastating impact sequestration would have on children and families. Sequestration is a group of automatic, across-the-board federal spending cuts scheduled to begin March 1, 2013. These cuts are evenly split between defense spending and discretionary domestic spending.

Yesterday, the White House released state-by-state reports on the impact the sequestration will have on children and families across the country if a compromise is not reached before the March 1^st deadline. For example, the projected automatic cuts to Head Start would mean that 300 fewer Maine children would have access to important services. This is not the direction we should be going in terms of providing access to quality early childhood education.

NEC and MCA will continue to talk to policy makers and the public about the impact of indiscriminate, across the board spending cuts on our nation’s most vulnerable children and families. If you want Congress to avoid these cuts, please reach out to Maine’s Congressional leaders and ask them to find a compromise.Earlier this month, NEC members sent letters to New England’s Congressional Delegation, including Senators King and Collins and Representatives Michaud and Pingree, asking them to support solutions that are balanced; that do not rely on cuts alone to achieve deficit reduction; that encourage job and wage growth, reduce income inequality; and, most of all, that keep families out of poverty.

To contact your Congressional leaders about sequestration, phone or email them today using the information below.

U.S. Senator Susan Collins
413 Dirksen Senate Office Building
Washington, DC 20510
Phone: (202) 224-2523
Fax: (202) 224-2693
e-mail: http://www.collins.senate.gov/public/index.cfm/email

U.S. Senator Angus King
188 Russell Senate Office Building
Washington, DC 20510
Phone: (202) 224-5344
Fax: (202) 224-1946
e-mail: http://www.king.senate.gov/contact.cfm

U.S. Representative Chellie Pingree
1318 Longworth House Office Building
Washington, DC 20515
Phone: (202) 225-6116
Fax; (202) 225-5590
e-mail: https://forms.house.gov/pingree/webforms/contact-form.shtml

U.S. Representative Mike Michaud
1724 Longworth House Office Building
Washington, DC 20515
Phone: (202) 225-6306
Fax: (202) 225-2943
e-mail: http://michaud.house.gov/email

Many of you have received this news in one form or another, but the Maine Children’s Alliance has undergone a staffing change. Our former Early Childhood Specialist Judy Reidt-Parker has accepted a great new job as Program Associate with the John T. Gorman Foundation in Portland. Judy joins an outstanding organization that has been very supportive of the Maine Children’s Alliance, and we know that our loss is the Gorman Foundation’s gain. We also know that she is well-positioned to continue her intelligent, passionate and effective efforts on behalf of Maine children, and look forward to continuing to work together whenever possible. If you have a chance to drop Judy a congratulatory note, her email address isjrparker@jtgfoundation.org.

One door closes and another opens, as is often the case. The Maine Children’s Alliance is very pleased to welcome Mary Henderson to our team as our new Senior Policy Analyst. Mary will be continuing MCA’s critical work on early childhood education and development, and has hit the ground running. Mary is a public interest attorney with more than 30 years of experience in low income advocacy, health care, and government. Mary was an attorney at Pine Tree Legal Assistance, the founding Executive Director of Maine Equal Justice Project, has held senior policy positions in Maine state government, and was recently an analyst for the National Academy for State Health Policy. We had many terrific applicants for the position, but are very fortunate to have someone of Mary’s caliber come to work at the MCA. Please join us in welcoming Mary! Her email address is mhenderson@mekids.org.

Thanks for your attention, and best wishes from MCA!

The Maine Children’s Alliance joined our partners Maine Equal Justice Partners, Maine People’s Alliance, Maine Women’s Lobby and Maine Center for Economic Policy to call upon legislators to pass a budget that expands opportunities for all Mainers. Read the full media release below.

CONTACT:  Sara Gagné-Holmes

Maine Equal Justice Parnters

(207) 626-7058, Ext. 201

sgh@mejp.org

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

Jan. 23, 2013

 AUGUSTA – With public hearings on Gov. Paul LePage’s supplemental budget beginning today, it’s time to change the conversation from the current cycle of crisis-and-cut budgeting to a long-term plan for Maine that makes building a stronger middle class and eliminating inequality a top priority.

“A strong middle class doesn’t happen by accident. It takes deliberate policy choices that can expand opportunities while helping families move from economic crisis to stability,” said Sara Gagné-Holmes, executive director for Maine Equal Justice Partners (MEJP). “The governor’s current budget proposals will pull the rug out from under thousands of families who are working hard to join the middle class. These are short-sighted initiatives that will slow the state’s ability to leave recession behind and create greater inequality.”

MEJP is joining with the Maine Center for Economic Policy (MECEP), the Maine People’s Alliance (MPA), the Maine Women’s Lobby (MWL) and the Maine Children’s Alliance (MCA) to call for sound public policy that expands opportunities for all Mainers.

Gov. LePage has proposed a supplemental budget to revise in the state’s current two-year spending plan and a two-year budget for 2014-2015 that would make drastic and dangerous changes, including a massive tax shift onto property tax payers, elimination of the program that provides prescription medicine to seniors and people with disabilities, reduction in support for retirees and devastating cuts to anti-poverty programs that fight homelessness and help working families.

“The governor’s proposals punish the middle class and working families by shifting the tax burden onto their backs. Growing the economy requires fair taxes with everyone paying their fair share,” said MECEP executive director Garrett Martin. “This budget benefits the wealthy at the expense of programs that strengthen and grow the middle class.”

“Maine people know that paving the way for economic progress means shoring up the middle class. That’s why Maine has a Property Tax and Rent Refund Program to help make property taxes more fair,” said MPA executive director Jesse Graham. “But only about half of the families eligible for refunds are participating in the program and refunds keep getting cut. Maine needs to restore refunds to their full value and enroll more low- and middle-income families who qualify but don’t participate.”

Hearings for the supplemental budget begin today at the State House.

“We know that a strong middle class is essential to Maine’s future prosperity, and we make that a reality by ensuring that all of us have access to health care and a quality education beginning in early childhood,” said MWL executive director Eliza Townsend. “These are two of the building blocks needed to create a pathway out of poverty for all Maine people.”

 Children are among those at greatest risk from the current budget proposals.

“Nearly one in five Maine children lives in poverty. We can’t turn our back on them,” said MCA executive director Ned McCann. “Head Start, home visitation, and similar programs help children begin their lives and education in a way that maximizes their opportunity for later success. Instead of focusing on short-term, boom- and-bust cycles, we must take a longer view that recognizes how important it is to invest in our children, their education and their futures.”

Maine Equal Justice Partners is a non-profit legal aid organization that works to find solutions to poverty. It is the leading organization in Maine for independent research and analysis of Maine’s safety net programs, and a trusted source for nonpartisan information on TANF, MaineCare, General Assistance and other aid programs.

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