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50 | P a g e FFY 2025–2027 CCDF State Plan

Core purposes of CCDF are to provide participating parents choice in their child care arrangements and provide their children with equal access to child care compared to those children not participating in CCDF. CCDF requirements approach equal access and parental choice comprehensively to meet these foundational program goals. Providing access to a full range of child care providers helps ensure that families can choose a child care provider that meets their family’s needs. CCDF payment rates and practices must be sufficient to support equal access by allowing child care providers to recruit and retain skilled staff, provide high-quality care, and operate in a sustainable way. Supply-building strategies are also essential. This section addresses many of the CCDF provisions related to equal access, including access to the full range of providers, payment rates for providers, co-payments for families, payment practices, differential payment rates, and other strategies that support parental choice and access by helping to ensure that child care providers are available to serve children participating in CCDF. In responding to questions in this section, OCC recognizes that each Lead Agency identifies and defines its own categories and types of care. OCC does not expect Lead Agencies to change their definitions to fit the CCDF-defined categories and types of care. For these questions, provide responses that closely match the CCDF categories of care. 4.1 Access to Full Range of Provider Options Lead Agencies must provide parents a choice of providers and offer assistance with child care services through a child care certificate (or voucher) or with a child care provider that has a grant or contract for the provision of child care services. Lead Agencies are reminded that policies and procedures should not restrict parental access to any type or category of care or provider (e.g., center care, home care, in-home care, for-profit provider, non-profit provider, or faith-based provider, etc.). 4.1.1 Parent choice a. Identify any barriers to provider participation, including barriers related to payment rates and practices, (including for family child care and in-home providers), based on provider feedback, public comment, and reports to the Lead Agency: In the most recent survey, conducted by the Lead Agency, to inquire about barriers to participation in child care subsidy, providers reported the following reasons for not participating in CCDF: 35 percent stated the families they currently served would not qualify for child care subsidy; 20 percent stated there was too much paperwork involved; 19 percent stated they were at full enrollment without participating; 15 percent stated families in the area they operated would not qualify; 11 percent stated payment rates were too low; and 10 percent stated payments took too long to receive. Beginning in May 2021, in response to the pandemic, the Lead Agency used funds from the Coronavirus Response and Relief Supplemental Appropriations Act (CRRSAA) and American Rescue Plan Act (ARPA) to pay all differences when the provider’s rate exceeded the subsidy payment, effectively paying the full price of care for all families. Despite removing all barriers related to provider payment rate amounts, the Lead Agency saw no increase in provider participation. This outcome indicates that payment rate amounts are not the most significant barrier to participation and reinforces the survey data that other barriers are more impactful in determining participation rates. For those providers that stated that there was too much paperwork involved, the program process has been improved to eliminate paper completely from all