Jackson Delivered On Affordable Child Care & Pledges to Create Universal Child Care

From now until the primary election, we will be running Troy Facts, a weekly column about our favorite logger Troy Jackson’s many accomplishments.

One the biggest struggles working-class people face is accessing affordable, quality childcare. Approximately 18,000 working-age Mainers are out of the labor force because of a lack of childcare. This costs Maine more than $400 million in lost earnings, productivity, and revenue every year. As Senate President, Troy Jackson made childcare affordability a priority, sponsoring LD 1726, which created the Maine Child Care Affordability Program to make childcare more affordable by paying a portion of the costs of care, increasing the number of child care options for working parents and raising wages for childcare workers. Unfortunately, there was a waitlist so many families were unable to take advantage of the program. But thanks to lobbying by union members, child care workers and providers, the Maine Legislature passed a budget this year that provides $10 million to the Child Care Affordability Program and clears the waiting list.

If elected, Troy pledges to create a universal child care program for Maine. This would provide a free year of child care to families earning up to 125 percent of the state median income and provide living wages to child care workers,  For families earning more, they would pay no more than 7 percent of their household income toward the cost of childcare.