SARASOTA COUNTY, Fla. — The cost of childcare continues to be a major concern for parents.
After my story aired in May, which explained how the cost of childcare for two kids has outpaced the cost of housing in Florida, an email from a provider in Sarasota showed up in my inbox.
She asked me to come down and take a tour of the facility she and her husband own so I could possibly get a few answers to the questions I and so many parents have about the high cost of childcare.
“Good morning!” I said as I waved to a group of 2-year-olds at Baby Fox Academy in Sarasota.
Several kids gave me tiny waves and hugs. The day gets started with a circle and a few songs.
“Hello! How are you? How are you this morning?” the kids sang.
On to the next few rooms—the older kids knead and shape slime, search for sea shells in rice, and play with kinetic sand—all things working their fine motor skills.
Stacey Lowell told me about her son’s progress.
“It’s been great. He loves coming to school. He talks about it,” she said. “He’s now 2 and a half, and he’s working on potty training, and they’re helping, which is nice, too, to have that support.”
“The minute I walked in here, I knew this was the place for my child to be,” said Kellie Naser. Her son started coming to Baby Fox as an infant.
“It was one of the few places I could find locally that had that option, and we were on a waitlist,” she said. “Which I was completely fine with because I knew the quality of care I was getting.”
Naser's got a point: there’s not a lot of infant care in Sarasota County. As of last month, the Department of Children and Families reports 143 licensed childcare centers in the county, including ones in homes.
Of those, the Early Learning Coalition of Sarasota works with 113, and it only refers infants to 51 of those centers.
All of this is happening in a county that’s grown by nearly 30,000 people since 2020, according to its government website.
“In our infant room, we do not show a profit. We actually show a loss in our infant room every single month. It’s not a small loss,” said Laurie McCracken.
She and her husband, Matthew, are the owners of Baby Fox Academy. She told me she understands why more people don’t take on infant/toddler rooms.
“Let’s be honest, nobody goes into business just to break even. Everybody goes into business to make money and be comfortable,” she said.
The price tag every month for their infant program is $1,500. It drops to $1,465 when the child turns 1 and even more when they turn 2.
Laurie walked me through the younger rooms and pointed out what makes them so expensive. Commercial cribs cost about $400 each, and they also have to have emergency evacuation cribs.
“They go in a crib that has bigger wheels and more reinforced, and that one is about $600,” she said.
A changing table that keeps liquid from passing through? That’s $1,200. Plumbing in these rooms is specific and costs a lot, too. Laurie and her husband estimate it’s about $20,000 to open one of these rooms and even more to maintain.
Laurie admits they are a bit stricter when it comes to child-to-adult ratios. The state requires one adult per four infants, and they go by a 1-3 ratio.
“We’re hearing from parents just this week who were saying I basically had to get on a waitlist for my infant when I was pregnant,” said Makayla Buchanan, the Director of Early Learning and Literacy at the Florida Chamber of Commerce.
I asked Buchanan what she thought was the catalyst for the high cost of childcare.
“I think it really stems to the access issue. And I don’t know if that’s going back to the fact that it’s so expensive to run an infant room because there’s lots of safety concerns and why the ratios are the way they are,” she said.
“We can’t sleep at night, knowing that our staff can’t pay their bills or their families,” Laurie said.
And that, right there, is an entirely separate cost. The minimum wage in Florida is $12 an hour, and the staff is paid $17 an hour.
“When you invest in your staff, and they love to come to work, and they feel valued, they stay,” Laurie said.
We recently told you about Florida lawmakers passing tax credits for businesses that offset the cost of childcare for employees. Laurie thinks something needs to be done for providers, possibly through grant money.
“Do you think we have a childcare crisis in our state?” I asked Laurie and Matthew.
“Absolutely. And it’s not just our state. I think it’s across the entire United States, and it’s just going to keep getting worse," Laurie said. "More and more providers are throwing in the towel for a variety of reasons."
“Now that we have more parents that are both working, it’s a need and it’s hard to get into these facilities sometimes,” said Lowell. “These childcare facilities really do need help and making sure that they’re providing the best care.”
Laurie has been in early childhood education for more than 30 years. It’s at the core of who she is. She tells me she doesn’t set aside a certain number of slots for school-readiness students—she essentially takes however many come her way because she knows how great the need is.
Right now, she has 30 school-readiness students at her two facilities. Those are families whose gross income is at or below the 150% federal poverty level, which for a family of three would be about $38,700.
If you have a childcare story you would like to share, please e-mail me at Heather.Leigh@wfts.com.
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