Hochul’s Toolkit For Child Care Resources For New Yorkers

A new 'business navigator' program that will offer a toolkit to help employers support their employees in finding child care services, and make more affordable child care for working families is underway.

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Hochul's New Program Aids Families In Finding Affordable Childcare

As part of her ongoing and historic $7 billion dollar initiative to expand New York families' access to affordable childcare, Governor Hochul has announced a Business Navigator Child Care toolkit.

The program, which was first addressed in the State of the State address last year (2023), is 'designed to support employers who want to assist their employees with securing quality, affordable child care services.'

As New York’s first mom governor, I know what it’s like to be a working professional with young children at home to care for. For countless New Yorkers, it’s a daily challenge that’s been overlooked by businesses and workforce leaders for too long. Today, we’re investing in expanding access to child care and improving affordability for families by providing the right tools in our toolkit for our employers and businesses to utilize.

READ MORE: Inflation Benefit To Help Hudson Valley Families

The Business Navigator: Employer’s Guide to Child Care Solutions in New York State

The Business Navigator toolkit is designed to connect more working families across the state to a single resource for childcare.

To date, the toolkit has been established in NY's ten 'Regional Economic Development Council’ regions, with a rollout continuing through January and February of 2025.

The toolkit itself is described as being 56-pages, and will serve as a statewide 'employer child care guidebook.' Essentially, the guide will allow companies and business owners (including HR departments) to meet the needs of their employees who have young children.

A 2021 report from the New York State Child Care Availability Task Force indicated that 'a majority' of NY business leaders felt:

the lack of accessibility and availability of high-quality child care for infants and toddlers negatively impacts their businesses and their ability to hire and retain employees

As a result, the new toolkit has information that will allow businesses to determine the child care needs of their employees, and then has resources to share with employees, including state tax incentives, benefits, even options for on-site child care services.

The full press release from the Governor's Office is available here.