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Month: November 2023

With Rousing Support, Columbus City Council Member Shayla Favor Enters Franklin County Prosecutor’s Race

Posted on

For Immediate Release

November 30, 2023

COLUMBUS – In a stirring press conference on Nov. 30 at The Historic Pythian Theater on Columbus’s Near East Side, Councilmember Shayla Favor announced that she will enter the Franklin County Prosecutor’s race. Flanked by prominent community leaders, including Council President Shannon Hardin and former Mayor Michael B. Coleman, Favor explained her decision to run. Her campaign released the following statement: 

“I am running for Franklin County Prosecutor because I want to support our community in becoming a model county that prioritizes public safety while being responsive to a system long considered to be unjust and inequitable,” Favor said. “I want to work in partnership with leaders across the region in creating a public safety model that leads with transparency, prioritizes accountability instead of retribution, and ensures the dignity of all Franklin County residents and visitors.” 

“Councilmember Favor is unapologetic in her commitment to people,” said Council President Shannon Hardin. “She is a fighter and a servant leader who acts with conviction and compassion. Now more than ever, Favor is what our community needs and deserves.” 

“Whether she was serving on Columbus City Council, serving in the Columbus City Attorney’s office, or litigating high profile environmental lawsuits that addressed public safety in our community, Favor has always put the needs of our community front and center,” said former Columbus Mayor Michael B. Coleman. “We can be sure of this one thing: from day one, she will roll up her sleeves and get to work.” 

Prior to joining Columbus City Council, Favor served as an Assistant City Attorney for the Columbus City Attorney’s Office in the Environmental Division. In that capacity, she served the downtown, Near East and Southside areas of Columbus. As a Zone Attorney, she worked alongside city and community leaders to provide essential city services, improve Columbus’ neighborhoods and facilitate conversations to address criminal activity, vacancies, abandonment, and blight. 

“From my time in the City Attorney’s Office, I am proud to have played a role in the City’s efforts to address criminal activity and neighborhood disparity through the abatement of nuisance properties,” Favor added. This work included the abatement of residential and commercial structures that were violating civil and criminal statues in the City of Columbus & State of Ohio.” 

Favor also worked as the executive director of Partners Achieving Community Transformation (PACT). PACT works to create a healthy, financially, and environmentally sustainable community where residents have access to safe and affordable housing, quality healthcare and education, and employment opportunities on the Near East Side of Columbus. 

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Child Care Advocates Sound Alarm on Child Care Crisis in Miami County

Posted on

For Immediate Release

Nov. 20, 2023

MIAMI COUNTY, Oh. – Renee Matsunami and Karen Stienecker, child care advocates in Miami County, are pleading with elected leaders to take action to address the child care crisis in the county and state. The duo runs Child Care Choices, a small nonprofit which provides training for child care providers, referrals for families needing care, and sponsors the Child and Adult Care Food Program. They are affiliated with The CEO Project and have been working with other organizations to bring solutions to the child care crisis in Miami County.

“Miami County is facing a shortage of child care that will affect this generation of children for a long time,” Matsunami said. “But this is an issue that impacts families at the county, state and national levels. We have found that the families most impacted by a lack of childcare are the families that need publicly funded childcare, families that have a child with special needs, families that need second, third and weekend shift care, and families with infants and toddlers.” 

“When parents need care and can’t find it, they feel desperate,” Stienecker said. “You can hear them close to tears on the phone and that is heartbreaking. Our system is forcing parents to settle for care that may not be up to their standards. We must face the fact that Ohio’s child care system is not stable or sustainable.”  

“We are a rural county,” Stienecker added. “We have a good percentage of children who need child care spots. Many of our centers don’t accept publicly-funded subsidies because they can fill their spots with private pay families. Today, there are only spots for less than half of the kids who need a publicly funded spot in Miami County. Ohio is one of the lowest in terms of reimbursement rates for publicly funded child care. The reimbursement rate is 25% and the recommendation is 75%.”  

“In Miami County we have no licensed family child care providers, which means a lack of second and third shift care.” Steinecker said. “The number of women who left the workforce has been staggering; many of them have not returned because there is a lack of childcare. In other situations, parents are depending on family, friends and neighbors to take care of their kids.”  

When asked why Ohio’s childcare system is in such a bind, Matsunami and Stienecker noted: 

  1. The licensing process is frustrating and overwhelming. Two providers we’ve been working with for close to a year are still not through the process. It takes a long time to complete the licensure process. The system is broken and we aren’t able to get people licensed. With the exception of one person who is licensed but set to move away from the county, we have zero licensed family child care providers in Miami County.  When we don’t have licensed family child care providers, families that need publicly funded childcare aren’t able to get those services.  
  2. Staffing shortages means fewer child care spots. The wages are so low that centers aren’t able to recruit and retain child care educators. The average wage for child care providers in Ohio is around $11 per hour. “It is hard to draw people into a career in early childhood education when other industries don’t require the same amount of education, and they pay more than $11 per hour. Down the road is a Chewy factory with starting rates of $19 per hour. When you’re looking at your bills, the difference between getting paid $19 or $11 per hour, that changes a family’s income,” Steinecker said. “The rules and regulations seem oppressive. We are crushing child care providers with rules. Our people are breaking under the weight that is put upon them by the system.” 
  3. The importance of high-quality early childhood education is not prioritized. Birth to age five are critical years in terms of brain development, which means that the care children receive during this period is vital to their future. About 60% of Ohio’s children are unprepared for kindergarten. Child care providers are not babysitters; they are educators who are ensuring that our children are ready for school

“Ohio’s child care system is in crisis” Matsunami said. “It’s time elected leaders invest in our future by investing in child care.”

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Dr. Sabrina N’Diaye To Headline New Jersey Prevention Network Workshop

Posted on

For Immediate Release

Nov. 16, 2023

BALTIMORE – Dr. Sabrina N’Diaye, an acclaimed author and psychotherapist, will lead a workshop for the New Jersey Prevention Network on December 6 from 9:00 a.m. to 4:00 p.m. The workshop is for social workers, chemical dependency counselors, and professional counselors. Attendees will receive six continuing education credits. N’Diaye will also discuss her most recent book, “Big Mama Speaks: Love Lessons from a Harlem River Swan.”

“I celebrate those who live in bowed service to other humans,” N’Diaye said. “Healers are able to hold grief and hope; joy and sorrow; and love and hate at the same time. We are special, and I want to be in service to this community through this and other workshops.”

WHO:             Dr. Sabrina N’Diaye of the Heart Nest Center

                        New Jersey Prevention Network

WHAT:           Guidance from the Other Side: Using Imagery, Journaling, and Love to Connect

WHEN:          December 6 at 9:00 a.m. to 4:00 p.m.

WHERE:       30 Park Rd | Suite 2 | Tinton Falls, NJ 0772

“I’m passionate about being a guide for people who work in healing fields,” N’Diaye said. “My goal is to offer therapists and healers another skill that they can use with their clients. I’ll talk about the science and research that validates the work. I want them to understand and use these skills for themselves and those who desire to stay on the path to recovery.”

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Child Care Providers Reveal Empty Promises, False Narrative from Alabama Department of Human Resources

Posted on

For Immediate Release

Nov. 8, 2023

“The truth is they are failing miserably.”

Montgomery, Ala. — On a media call organized by the Alabama Institute of Social Justice and the Raising Child Care Fund, Alabama child care center directors and owners spoke out about the state’s failure to effectively roll out funding from the recently expired American Rescue Plan Act (ARPA) or implement programs to fix the broken system. The ARPA funding, which expired in September, was intended to stabilize the child care sector by supplementing care rates, but instead increased taxes to Alabama center owners and put many in a further deficit. While other states provided the funding in the form of grants, Alabama center owners received it as payroll creating a tax burden.

“Now that the money has gone, we feel that it could have been given out in a different manner so it would have lasted a lot longer,” said Constance Dial, PhD, who runs a center in Mobile, Ala. “Now we are back to where we were prior to the pandemic, and we were already working with an old system that needed to be dismantled and rebuilt.”

Providers expressed they are not able to pay enough to retain staff or recruit new teachers, and many are leaving the field.

“We still don’t have enough finances to increase salaries, so we’re fighting Starbucks, WalMart, and all these entities that we shouldn’t have to fight because we should be at an equal hourly rate,” continued Dial. “I’m looking for teachers. I’m down two teachers.”

“Every day we’re struggling. I’ve been doing this for 22 years and struggling for 22 years. Providers are worn out and ready to give up.”

Providers say the Department of Human Resources is controlling the narrative and painting a picture that it is doing all it can, while ignoring solutions brought forth by those actually providing care.

“What they are not telling you is, for me, they’re only paying $128 a week,” said Kishia Saffold, MBA, owner of Kiddie Care Learning Center Enterprise. “We see the numbers in the news and in the media about the exorbitant cost of child care all over the country, and at $128 we’re still having to require our parents to pay the difference between what the state pays and our rate. They’re not paying rates that are in line with our industry or with the rates of food cost.”

One solution providers agree on is addressing the state’s market rate survey, which was intended to determine child care rates based on location. Providers say the DHR publicly promised to form a committee to revisit the survey, and instead reinstituted it.

“We know the market rate survey is a failed tool. It does not get to the true cost of child care, and it creates a schism in the system as to who gets certain rates,” said Lenice Emanuel, Executive Director of the Alabama Institute for Social Justice. “Most providers don’t even fill it out because it doesn’t serve any purpose to advance the economic status of an organization.”

“Sometimes we are hogtied because the system is broken. It is splintered because one area is trying to move forward, and another is not even thinking about it,” said provider Lisa Nimmer in Greenville, Ala. “We need to value each and every child. This is the time to focus on [ages] 0-5. This is where we need to put our resources, not in higher ed. We need to focus on 0-5.”

 

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