Child Care Update
Dear Child Care Providers:
Governor Walz’s top priority is the health and safety of Minnesotans. As a result of the unprecedented danger that COVID-19 presents for our state, Governor Walz issued an Executive Order today that directs Minnesotans to Stay at Home and limit movements outside of their homes beyond essential needs for two weeks. This will be effective Friday, March 27 through Friday, April 10. In addition, the Governor extended the closure of bars, restaurants, and other public accommodations (until May 1, 2020) and authorized the Commissioner of Education to implement a Distance Learning Period beginning on March 30, 2020 until May 4, 2020.
These executive orders directing closures do not apply to child care providers. Caregivers and child care providers are expressly listed as critical sector exemptions. Essential activities of critical sectors and emergency workers include the transportation of children and families to a child care provider and caregiver transportation to and from home or other setting.
What does this mean?
This means that child care providers can continue to operate for the service of those families listed within critical sectors and emergency workers. Families in these sectors will continue to need child care in order for health care services, public safety and law enforcement activities, critical transportation, energy, IT services, and many other sectors listed in the Executive Order.
The Executive Order expressly encouraged child care providers to remain open to provide child care services to the critical sectors only until the Stay At Home order period ends. Our guidance encourages those of you open to provide care for children of all essential workers in the Governor’s Stay at Home order. We ask that you prioritize in this order (described in more detail here):
- Tier 1 (age 0 to 5)
- Other essential workers (age 0 to 5), and
- Children of essential workers, including school-age.
Schools are directed to provide school-age care to district-enrolled 5 to 12 year olds to tier 1 critical sectors. If they cannot do so, schools are asked to work with child care providers to identify and contract for this care if possible. All other families within the critical sectors (many groups beyond the tier 1) will continue to need your services.
Families are ordered to Stay at Home, other than exempted activities like going to the grocery store, doctor, walking outside or other activities here; people working in critical sectors, are permitted to leave home if they need to do so for work. There is not anything in the order that specifically prohibits a family from taking their child to child care and if a private child care provider wants to continue taking kids, the Executive Order does not expressly prohibit that; however, this is not keeping with the overall message and spirit of the Governor’s Stay At Home order and the need to keep child care providers open for emergency workers. As a result of the Governor asking people in non-critical sectors to stay home, families you were previously serving may no longer be able to utilize your care during the period of the Stay At Home order (through April 10).
Updated guidance to support you during this time is available here.
Thank you and supports
Thank you for your service and work as a critical sector and backbone of our communities. To date, we have heard from 2,020 providers (including family child care and center providers) who are available to provide care to children of emergency and critical workers within these critical sectors. The survey and map of childcare providers who are open to care for critical sector families is available on mn.gov/childcare. As the status changes, providers should update their information on the survey. Child Care Aware of MN is also providing information on providers available to care for children of emergency and critical workers by phone at 888.291.9811.
This week the Governor talked to the media about the importance of child care providers and encouraged families to utilize your businesses. The Governor also issued a letter out to employers here encouraging these critical sector employers to utilize existing child care providers. We are also working with the legislature to provide emergency grant funding of approximately $30 million to those of you willing to care for these emergency workers and we are working with the private sector to help identify additional resources as well.
Child care providers should also continue to use the hotline (1-888-234-1268) for questions and concerns. Continue to use the webpage as a resource for additional information available from agencies in the Children’s Cabinet including the Departments of Education, Health, and Human Services.
This pandemic is painstakingly hard to fathom. The Governor believes we must take action now. The current modelling shows that if we take no action to combat the spread or fail to prepare our health care system, more than 70,000 of our loved ones, friends, and neighbors in Minnesota could die. By staying at home, we will limit the spread of COVID-19 in our communities. While the virus will still be there when this order ends, this Stay at Home order and other community mitigation strategies give Minnesota time to ready for battle and work with our world-renowned health care sector, cutting-edge manufacturers, innovative business community, and Minnesotans across the state.
Together, as One Minnesota, we can make a plan and we can save lives. You are a part of that plan and we are grateful.
Thank you,
Erin Bailey
Executive Director of the Governor’s Children’s Cabinet
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