LDE offering child care assistance program for healthcare workers

Lake Charles, LA (KPLC) - The Louisiana Department of Education has launched a child care assistance program to help combat the shortage of healthcare workers amid the fourth COVID-19 surge.

Many healthcare workers have been overworked for a year and a half now, and with the recent surge in COVID-19 hospitalizations, they are in overdrive at work and at home.

“We all have pandemic fatigue, right? But I think in the healthcare industry, it’s especially worse,” Lisa Brochard with the Louisiana Department of Education said. “I mean, they see the worst of the worst situations, right? We don’t want to get that moment where our healthcare system crashes, right? None of us want that.”

The Child Care Assistance Program (CCAP) is open to essential healthcare personnel in tier 1 or 2 facilities. This may include nursing staff, janitorial staff, nutritional staff, respiratory therapists, occupational therapists and others who are essential in acute care facilities.

Through CCAP, families would be able to access subsidized child care for 12 months for children 12 and under at qualifying publicly funded childcare centers, including registered and certified in-home providers. The Louisiana Department of Education would then directly pay the funds to the provider, covering child care costs near $8,000 to $9,000 for the whole year.

“If this can, you know, alleviate some of that burden - help to retain nursing and support staff in Louisiana, recruit nursing and support staff in Louisiana... that’s what we’re hoping this can do,” Brochard said.

The deadline to apply for the program is October 31, 2021. To access the application, click HERE.

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