The Oakland City Council passed a budget amendment to equitably reopen Head Start childcare centers in Oakland’s most underserved communities at a special meeting on September 1.

The amendment was prompted by grass roots organizations that last month put out an urgent statement demanding the protection of vitally needed services provided by the Head Start Centers.

Vice Mayor Rebecca Kaplan, Council President Nikki Fortunato Bas, President Pro Tempore Sheng Thao, and Councilmember Carroll Fife coordinated with community members who called in to support the funding of the Head Start centers.

The Council members immediately went into action releasing an action plan to stop the planned closures of the Head Start programs, which if allowed to close, will disproportionately impact some of the most under-resourced communities in Oakland.

According to the Bureau of Labor Statistics, working mothers have been the most impacted by cuts to the workforce resulting from the COVID-19 pandemic.

The closures of schools and childcare centers created a scarcity in childcare providers causing childcare costs to reach an all-time high in 2020.  As California is reopening, mothers are finding it harder to rejoin the workforce due to the lack of affordable childcare.

The City Administration planned to close the Arroyo Viejo, Franklin, and Tassafaronga centers, all located in Oakland’s most underserved communities, which would have disproportionately aimed cuts at Black people, and worsen suffering in Oakland’s hardest-hit communities, low-income families, and people of color.

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The planned cuts also involve inequitable layoffs of the workers and undermine the community’s economic recovery at a precarious time.

The councilmembers’ proposal will allocate funding from an excess fund to prevent the complete closure of the three Head Start Centers.

Rev. Phyllis Scott, the first female president of the Pastors of Oakland, said her organization will work with the councilmembers who want to find the funds to restore all Head Start centers to full strength.

She said, “our underserved mothers and children, which includes my granddaughter — who was born at less than two pounds — were helped by the Head Start program. Many other families need this program that our doctors also prescribe as being supportive of early childhood development.”

Vice Mayor and Councilmember At-Large Rebecca Kaplan stated, “We must prioritize equity in our city’s COVID-19 recovery plan, and allowing our most impacted communities to have vitally needed services is a high priority.

“Head Start is an important program which helps children, with lifelong positive impacts on their future, and ensures access to economic recovery for struggling working parents. The Administration’s plan to close these needed centers and lay off these essential workers, while hiding the information from the Council and the public for months, is inappropriate.”

Nikki Fortunato Bas, Council President and District 2 Representative said that most vulnerable children and families in Oakland must be supported. The Franklin Head Start Center serves a diverse community in District 2, from the Chinatown to Eastlake to San Antonio neighborhoods, and I am fighting to protect the services for these families and the jobs for the workers caring for our children.”

“Robust investment in Head Start is investment in our future; it is long-term public safety planning; it is the right thing to do,” said District 3 Councilmember Carroll Fife. “Our local government cannot allow Head Start to fail. To do so would be to continue the practice of State-sanctioned discrimination that creates new racialized disparities and perpetuates existing ones… I am disheartened to find out that this urgent matter has been brewing for months and has only now come to the attention of the city’s elected leaders as a crisis to fix. As a working-class Black woman, like many of our Head Start providers, I have lived experience in needing access to affordable childcare. And as an elected official, I am committed to doing what it takes to keep our centers open, funded and accessible to the families who need them most.”

Sheng Thao, Council President Pro Tempore and District 4 Representative said that every parent knows the first five years of a child’s development have an enormous impact on the adult they will become.  “Head Start is a vital resource to the children and parents that need support.  One of my top priorities is making sure every child in Oakland has a chance to succeed.  I will continue to fight to make sure Oakland Head Start is fully funded, and Oakland children are not forgotten.”

Kimberly Jones, chief of staff for Councilmember Rebecca Kaplan, provided this report.

The Oakland Post’s coverage of local news in Alameda County is supported by the Ethnic Media Sustainability Initiative, a program created by California Black Media and Ethnic Media Services to support community newspapers across California.

Isabelle Price

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