Hundreds Protest 8% Cuts To Child Care

Child care centers throughout Las Cruces and across New Mexico closed for the day to boycott for lower cuts to providers. Early Childhood Awareness Day was anything but a typical walk in Apodaca Park in North Las Cruces.

“Every child deserves quality child care,” a parent protestor said.

Child care workers, parents, and kids crowded the fields in protest and some traveled hundreds of miles from across the state to show their disapproval of deep cuts to child care.

“This is going to get the attention of those that aren’t paying attention,? another parent said.

Waving strongly-worded signs, nearly 300 parents, providers, and their kids protested Governor Bill Richardson?s 8% cuts to child care.

“Parents aren’t able to function without child care,” a woman, who traveled from Alamogordo, said.

Others traveled from Albuquerque to help spread the message.

?It’s going to be a long haul,? a parent, with his two daughters beside him, said. ?I feel optimistic we’ve taken the first step.”

And this first step toward fighting for statewide change comes after centers like Alpha School have already had to lay-off a half-dozen employees and slash benefits. And as reported on ABC-7, across town, Kid?s Castle locked their looked last week, forever.

“We need to be careful that we don?t cut so much we then are harming the children,” State Senator Mary Kay Papen of Las Cruces, who serves on the Legislative Finance Committee, said.

Governor Richardson already used $2-million of stimulus money to reduce child care cuts from 10% to 8%, but Papen said, Thursday?s rally is a way for parents and providers to plead for more.

“I’m hoping they will be able to prevail upon the governor to maybe get some more of his personal stimulus funds,” Papen said.

Ray Jaramillo from Alpha School organized the rally, and said statewide support is a start.

“People are talking and when people talk some people don’t agree some people do, but without that talk and that start, things don’t happen,? Jaramillo said.

Parents said centers like Kid?s Kountry who closed their doors for the Day Without Child Care was out of respect for what they value most.

?This is their way of showing they care about our children and I really applaud the centers who had the courage to do it,? a parent said.

The next legislative session meets in January. Senator Paper said whoever the next governor is, legislators will plead with her to put money back into child care.