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Dear Child Care Providers:
As a child care provider you deliver an essential service to our state, including educating Minnesota’s children and ensuring the stability of our state’s workforce. You provide care and early education to our youngest Minnesotans and support our working families so that they can go to work or school. Thank you.
During this pandemic outbreak of COVID-19, we want to express our special gratitude for the efforts you and your staff are undertaking to continue to serve children and families and protect the health, safety and wellbeing of children and staff. Based on the evidence, children are less likely to get sick from COVID-19 and if they do, their cases are typically mild. The systems and processes – such as cleaning toys, keeping sick children home, washing hands, and other practices – that you use every day to keep the community healthy and safe are the exact defenses we need now.
In addition to the State Emergency Operations Center and Minnesota Department of Health hotlines available now, a dedicated hotline for child care providers has launched to provide rapid response and resources to address concerns during this evolving situation.
All Minnesotans should continue to follow the Department of Health guidance to protect themselves and mitigate transmission of COVID-19. People who are 70 and older, or people of any age who have underlying health conditions that put them at a higher risk of severe illness from COVID-19, should stay at home and avoid gatherings or other situations of potential exposures, including travel. This includes your employees. We understand that this may impact your usual operations.
If you have questions, please call the DHS hotline at 1-888-234-1268 for more information. In addition, the information posted in this document provides coordinated guidance on actions to protect and support your staff and the children and families you serve.
We also understand the urgent need to continue to provide ongoing and accessible resources – technical and financial – to support you during this evolving crisis and afterward. In order to support you in remaining open and mitigate the effects on your business, your staff, and the families and communities you serve, we have directed state agencies to collaborate and align resources to support you.
State agencies, including the Department of Employment and Economic Development, the Department Human Services, and others, are working to identify resources and options – technical, operational and financial – for you to adapt to the emerging crisis response, support your staff, and ensure long-term viability of your business.
In our efforts to address this pandemic across our state, we will continue to make communicating with child care providers a priority. Thank you for all you have and will continue to do to serve working families and their children.
 Governor Tim Walz
 Lt. Governor Peggy Flanagan
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