2020-05-18 Chelsea Krema
Charlene Way
From:Chelsea Krema <kremac@gmail.com>
Sent:Monday, May 18, 2020 2:44 PM
To:City Clerk
Subject:Comment on Frazier Council Review/Elisabeth Songe
External Sender - Please use caution with links or attachments.
To Whom It May Concern:
My name is Chelsea Krema and I am an advocate for child care. Elisabeth Songe is providing an extremely valuable service to her
community by providing licensed child care in her home. It is so important that parents have a place to leave their children while
they go to work where they feel comfortable. Child care contributes to the economic success of our communities and families. This
was recently highlighted in the following: https://www.ktvb.com/article/news/local/report-child-care-issues-cost-idaho-479-million-
a-year/277-5655287c-f2de-4c4b-bde0-d2db1f68960a
Beyond that, home based child care provides a substantial percent of care statewide for infants and toddlers. The first 1000 days of
a child's life are a critical period of brain development, and child care providers play a huge role in supporting healthy brain
development. Elisabeth speaks Swahili and is able to support children learning multi-lingual learning as well!
Elisabeth is providing an important and valuable service to her community. Without home based child care many families Idaho
families would have even more limited options for child care. According to Child Care Aware, "in Idaho there are 76,312 children
under the age of 6 with one or both parents in the labor force. There are 650 center-based programs and 487 home-based programs
in the state, providing 52,434 licensed child care slots." With a statewide shortage of 20,000+ licensed child care slots, the service
that Elisabeth to her community in Meridian is extremely
valuable. https://ccaoa.maps.arcgis.com/apps/MapSeries/index.html?appid=f9a356698dd74bb28eb1eb54ab305b20
I hope that this review panel and the community can recognize the importance of Elisabeth's work, and all child care for the
success of families living in Meridian.
Sincerely,
Chelsea Krema
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