400 NYC Children to Lose Daycare

A daycare center that provides care for close to 400 children is on the verge of closing because it hasn’t been reimbursed by the city’s Department of Education.

Last week, the NYPost reported that Sheltering Arms, which runs six centers across three boroughs, was in danger of closing because, like many others, it had not received reimbursement from the DOE.

After spending up to a year without receiving funds and due to difficulties with enrollment brought on by the COVID-19 pandemic, Sheltering Arms has informed families and staff that it will cease operations in December.

Elizabeth McCarthy, CEO of Sheltering Arms, remarked that her organization runs “a really excellent program.”

“I believe our closure will be a significant loss to the city,” she added.

Early Childhood Advocates across the city last month raised the alarm that they were owed millions of dollars from the previous school year at some of the 1,400 locations under contract with the Department of Education.

The pandemic caused student enrollment to decline at many childcare centers across the country, including Sheltering Arms sites, adding to the financial hardship already experienced by the city sites. Sheltering Arms operates centers in the Bronx, Manhattan, and Queens.

Additionally, Sheltering Arms links families to a variety of resources, such as fatherhood programs and mental health services through its childcare programs.

“Not every father is capable of braiding their daughters’ hair,” according to McCarthy, “So we held workshops on such topics.”

Still on the News…

McCarthy cautioned that parents might feel cut off from those other programs, which the children’s and family services organizations will continue to offer in other settings if their centers citywide disappear after more than ten years of operation.

According to James Potter, who manages center compliance and frequently visits classrooms across the system, “Everyone likes to think it’s just daycare. It’s not just daycare. It’s an early childhood center.”

He stated, “it’s not just about learning your ABCs. It revolves around learning how to be a little person.”

The initiatives, according to Potter, assisted families with a variety of difficulties, including immigration assistance, and dental and medical treatment.

According to Potter and McCarthy, a number of service providers are considering joining the suite in closing their doors as a result of a confluence of financial pressures.

Accessing the situation, DOE spokesperson Suzan Sumer describes the payment issues as systems developed by former Mayor Bill de Blasio that were “not adequate and need to be updated.” She said these issues are a “priority” of this current administration. The DOE disputed that the payments to Sheltering Arms were late and cited late invoices, but other suppliers told The NYPost that the systems prevented them from receiving reimbursements.

The Division of Early Development Education under Mayor Eric Adams has made it known that they are not committed to de Blasio’s plan to add 60,000 places to early childhood programs for 3-year-olds.

At a separate press conference, Adams stated, “What my analysis discovered in the first few months was that the number of seats that were assigned were not actually being filled.”

According to official city data, the city provided 46,000 3-K seats for the 2017–2018 academic year, and 83% of them were filled.