CONGRESS MANGLES HEADSTART FUNDING

Some 77% of Head Start programs report that they are “at or near the breaking point” and unable to absorb a budget cut and the hundreds of new unfunded mandates imposed in the 2007 federal reauthorization act, according to a survey by the National Head Start Association. NHSA is urging House and Senate appropriators pass a $472 million FY 2008 supplemental appropriation to cover the nearly $11 million cut in the FY 2008 Head Start budget, as well as the wide array of costly new requirements approved last December.

63% of Head Start program directors expect to lose good teachers and assistants. About half reported that they already are much less able to keep good teachers because many of the poorly paid teachers either leave the teaching profession or go to work in public schools where teacher salaries are often much higher.

49% of Head Start programs reported that their waiting lists of children in need of services have increased, but these programs lack the enrollment slots to serve them. 62% of programs have been forced to reduce days of operation and/or reduce hours on operating days.

Holyoke-Chicopee-Springfield Head Start Executive Director Janis Santos said: “In my 35 years working in the Head Start community, this is one of the direst funding situations I have seen, if not the worst ever. The hardest thing for any program to do is have to request a reduction in enrollment. We are at the breaking point today and have to count every penny and analyze every expense with painstaking detail. . . We have 500 children on the wait list for our programs. Now, we are being asked under the new bill to serve the extremely needy community of homeless, but we aren’t even funded enough to serve the children already looking to our program for their education needs. We want to help all the kids who need it but can’t without the necessary funds to do the job.”

More than a quarter (28 percent) of Head Start programs have had to cut or eliminate employee health care benefits over the past year. About the same percentage (27percent) have had to cut or eliminate other employee benefits.

More than three out of four (78 percent) programs reported that over the past year they have eliminated staff positions and reassigned job responsibilities to other staff members.

More than three out of five (77 percent) programs have been forced to slash transportation services

SURVEY