Funding Cuts in West Virginia

In West Virginia, there are plans being made to cut back on child care assistance for a number of families. Some families will no longer be able to receive the child care assistance while others will begin paying more out of their own pockets for the child care that they are in need of. Millions of dollars will also be cut from the funding of social services, which includes various programs such as the nutrition programs. With the new changes set as a possible plan, there will be thousands of children who are cut from the program. The child care program helps parents who work so that they can afford care for the children while they are working.

There are several different reasons as to why these cuts are being made. One of the primary reasons is that the state has basically gone above and beyond its federal funding and several different grants are coming to an end. Grants for some funded programs will no longer be available, especially if those programs were not working or doing as well to begin with. The child care assistance program, however, is a program that many people depend on. Low-income parents rely on this program as way of getting the childcare they need while they are working or even going to school to further their education so that they can find a better job. However, in West Virginia, new families looking to get the assistance will not be able to enroll and this will be effective starting on the 1^st of August. At that point, some families will also be taken out of the program and will no longer have their childcare paid for, depending upon the income earned within the household. There are certain children who will not have to deal with these changes, which includes foster children and children who are receiving TANF, also known as Temporary Aid for Needy Families.

Some of the families who are currently on the program will have to start paying more for their childcare payments as the assistance program will no longer be able to pay nearly as much as it was paying towards the childcare of these children. Parents who normally paid 5 percent of the cost will now be asked to pay 12 percent of the child care costs. Parents are often asked to pay around $6 per week for child care and will now be expected to pay about $14 per week instead.

While several grants were cut, there are some grants that have not been cut. Those have been cut are the programs that simply did not work, which includes programs that were designed to strengthen the relationships between two parents, as though results did not meet the original expectations.