Child care advocates in Maine are calling on state legislators to reject Governor Janet Mills' proposed cuts to child care wage supports and to the Head Start program.
They say the $30 million cuts to child care wage subsidies will reduce the average childcare worker's annual salary by $2,500 dollars, and may force some to leave the industry.
Meghann Carrasco, executive director of Seedlings to Sunflowers, a childcare center in Gorham, said this would only make the educator shortage worse.
"Educators have left the field at such high numbers that those of us in leadership positions have had to put ourselves in the precarious position about bidding each other for quality staff. Do you realize that this outbidding has been primarily on the backs of Maine families?" Carrasco said.
Carrasco said if the state won't maintain wages at current levels, child care centers will be forced to pay more to retain staff and and raise tuition for families.
The federal Head Start program is partially funded through $3.6 million dollars annually from the state, and supports low-income families through comprehensive child care services.
Jeannette Umugwaneza, a Head Start parent, said the program helped her transition from general assistance to full time employment.
"Just think about the other parents like me and children like my own, who didn't have social life, who didn't have a parent who speak the language, who didn't have a parent who went to school here to just keep Head Start and the other childhood education funded," Umugwaneza said.
Heather Marden, with the Maine Association for the Education of Young Children, estimates that the loss in state funding to the Head Start program will leave almost 200 families without support.
