MISSOURI, USA — The I-Team has uncovered troubling problems with the state's education department failing to reimburse child care centers, putting livelihoods at stake.
“This problem could possibly destroy the economy in the state of Missouri," said Samantha Cross, district director of Little Precious Angels Childcare, a south St. Louis-based child care center.
“These families are like my family," Cross said.
For the last four months, Cross said she has not been fully reimbursed by the state for child care subsidies. The I-Team discovered that internal system-wide issues are to blame.
“You do everything that you can, but there's nothing you can do in this situation," Cross said.
Nearly all of the children at her child care center live below the poverty level. She’s among the roughly 1,500 child care centers across Missouri that depend on reimbursements from the state to keep the doors open. Now, she’s working weekend side jobs to stay afloat.
“I fry chicken on the weekends," Cross said. “These kids are like my kids, and to think that they would have to be on the street because the state can't keep up with their contracts … It just breaks my heart.”
She's experienced endless hours on hold, unanswered questions and mounting stress.
“I still have not gotten a response for any of my 12 tickets that I put into the system," Cross said. “The system is still not working.”
Cross said the state has probably known that this was a problem since October, when providers stopped getting paid.
The state's response was a statement filled with promises and apologies. Despite multiple requests, a spokesperson with the Missouri Department of Elementary and Secondary Education (DESE) refused an on-camera interview. Instead, they sent a statement citing “unforeseen challenges” during a system transition, which they became aware of in early January. The switch-over involved moving from old, inefficient data systems.
Casey Hanson is the deputy director at the nonprofit Kids Win Missouri. She said DESE’s new system involves getting various systems to talk to each other. She said she doesn’t know if they anticipated how it would impact payments to providers. As a result, many payments for providers have been delayed.
“Child care providers depend on state subsidy payments and/or fees paid by families to fund the services they provide. When there are months of delays and/or inaccuracies in payments to the provider, the child care provider’s budget is impacted, therefore potentially creating challenges to meet their financial obligations," said Robin Phillips, Child Care Aware of Missouri's CEO.
DESE said that issues with subsidy reimbursements from October to December were authorization issues coupled with data system issues that led to payment delays. The launch of the new system was among the reasons there were issues with processing payments from October to December, according to a DESE spokesperson. Starting in early January, when the new system was launched, providers faced additional payment issues.
DESE told us the new system launched for families in December and for providers in January.
“You go to your documents. Nothing. There's nothing there," Cross said.
For child care providers, these challenges have real consequences.
Cross described the state's handling of the issue as “unethical" and "immoral."
The I-Team pressed for accountability from state lawmakers.
“This is unacceptable," State Sen. Mary Elizabeth Coleman (R-District 22) said.
Coleman expressed shock and concern.
“We're going to have to find out where the ball was dropped and who was responsible for doing that," Coleman said.
A Facebook group called Missouri Childcare Providers Professional Discussion Group shows countless providers are not getting the payments they’ve been promised from the state. The I-Team has been in touch with at least 12 child care centers, all desperate for a lifeline and on the brink of closure.
Already, 60% of the counties in Missouri are “child care deserts," places where there are not enough options to fill the need, according to Child Care Aware of Missouri, based on the latest data available.
Providers fear these deserts will spread since they can no longer pay their bills.
“A lot of these providers have gotten second mortgages on their personal homes in order to pay staff to pay for supplies," Cross said.
Families and child care providers need concrete solutions, and they need them now. The I-Team's investigation continues as we demand answers and accountability from those responsible for ensuring the well-being of Missouri's children and families.
Missouri Department of Elementary and Secondary Education's full statement and additional responses to specific questions:
“The new Child Care Data System (CCDS) allows families and providers to have a web-based, near real-time system to enter and view their information for child care subsidy. DESE’s Office of Childhood (OOC) launched the CCDS in December 2023, and there have been a number of unforeseen challenges during the transition, which involves loading family and provider data from the existing, outdated state systems into the new CCDS. The OOC is working hard to mitigate these issues and sincerely apologizes to the child care providers and families affected. OOC and its vendors have been focused on addressing the systemwide issues related to provider payments to ensure child care providers can receive accurate subsidy payments as quickly as possible. Payments are now being processed daily for attendance claims and corrections submitted by providers.
While there are a few systemwide issues left to resolve, if a child care provider has attendance claims that have not been processed yet, is most likely because the provider is not yet authorized to provide child care for the family or the provider and/or family account is missing information, which is preventing the payment from being processed. OOC staff are also working to process payment corrections from recent months. Most of those issues will require manual fixes by OOC and vendor staff; this work is underway but will take longer to complete.
OOC continues to communicate with families who need child care assistance to address their account issues and would appreciate media partners sharing this information with viewers/readers as well. There are two primary issues with family accounts in the CCDS:
Families who had a subsidy account before the CCDS transition in December 2023 must connect their information to their new CCDS account. Families can learn more here.
Once approved for subsidy, families must select or change their child care provider in their CCDS account. That ensures the child care provider receives subsidy for the correct children. Families can learn more here.”
We asked the Missouri Department of Elementary and Secondary Education how many child care centers in Missouri are impacted by the subsidy reimbursement problem. A spokesperson told us: “...The transition challenges involved loading family and provider data from the existing, outdated state systems into the new CCDS. There were issues with all data involved, ultimately impacting all subsidy families and providers. The Office of Childhood has identified the major system issues to date and working through those solutions. OOC staff are also working individually with providers and families who report their accounts are not working properly. OOC and its vendors recognize the importance of subsidy payments to the child care industry, and are working to get parent and provider accounts fully operational to ensure payments are timely and accurate.”
We also asked for the date that the department was notified of the issue regarding day cares not being reimbursed. A spokesperson told us: “OOC staff were alerted on Jan. 8, when data was first ingested into the new system and processing issues began.”
If you'd like to get in touch with our I-Team, leave a voice message at 314-444-5231, email Paula directly at tips@ksdk.com or use the form below. All calls and correspondence will be kept confidential.
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