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Child Care Scholarship Policy Manual 7
COVID-300% funding ended September 30, 2023.
A waiver was approved on September 22, 2022 indicating that staff were not required to call for verification on employment letters when all of the information was provided on those letters that we need for eligibility determination purposes. That waiver applied only to the following categories regarding the need for calling to verify employment letters: COVID- 19, COVID-300%, CCDF-85% and Strong Start-85%. NOTE: All other funding categories required calls for verifications.
Effective 11/14/2023, the verification of employment form is no longer required. The information from the letter will be used to determine eligibility when all the information to determine eligibility is present on the letter. This applies to all COVID related child care categories, CCDF-85% and Strong Start-85% only. **CCDF-85% - CCDF-85% funded began being used effective 5/16/2023. Any client that was at or below 85% SMI were categorized under CCDF-85%. If the applicant was over 85% SMI but was under 300% of FPL, then we were able to use COVID-300% funding.
**Strong Start – 85% Child Care was effective 10/01/2023. This category is the only category with a co-pay at this time. Note: There was a system glitch for the dates of 10/01/2023-11/07/2023 where co-pays were not being assessed by the system. Our IT staff resolved this issue on 11/07/2023.
Effective 06/18/2024, all eligibility for all child care categories will be based on 85% State Median income.
Effective 10/01/2024, all clients that are at or below 150% of federal poverty level will not be assessed a copayment. Note: not all client fees pulled correctly due to an IT error. Corrected 11/10/2024 forward.
Effective December 1, 2025, the Child Care Scholarship Program placed a pause on accepting any new applications unless the families fall within a protected category. The pause affects determination and redetermination of eligibility for all cases except those in a protected category.