Yearlong wait lists, high prices plague Nebraska parents looking for day care

LINCOLN, Neb. (KLKN) – New parents are running into roadblocks when it comes to child care in the Lincoln area.

Not only is it expensive, but it’s also hard to find an open spot.

When Jessica Harris and her boyfriend had their daughter in February, she said, they searched around Lincoln but had no luck.

The places she called were $300 to $400 a week. And they would have to pay for a full-time spot, “even if she was only there a few hours a week.”

They only needed a day care for around 10 hours a week.

But many child care centers no longer offer part-time spots.

Lincoln Littles, which works with dozens of providers in the area, said short staffing is the main problem.

Anne Brandt, the executive director, said part-time child care doesn’t make much sense for centers with short staffing because they have to meet certain ratios.

“If you have less staff to work with, that might be the first thing that goes,” she said.

For many day cares, it creates a vicious cycle.

Without workers, providers are forced to cut back on the number of kids they can care for, which, in turn, lowers their revenue, making it more difficult to hire.

“We know that there’s a lot of child care providers here in town right now that are not operating at capacity,” Brandt said.

For parents who need a day care, this can be stressful.

“A lot of the places that we looked at, it was a year wait list,” Harris said. “So pretty much the moment you find out you’re pregnant, you better start looking for places.”

Without an affordable option, Harris and her partner had to hire an in-home babysitter.

While it turned out well for them, Harris knows that for many other families, particularly single parents, that might not be an option.

“Affording day care, trying to work, it almost seems impossible,” she said.

Lincoln Littles is working to help day care providers by holding training sessions for potential workers.

And many state senators said they will focus on this problem during the upcoming legislative session.