Soon, I intend to introduce legislation requiring greater transparency, oversight, and reporting of taxpayer-funded child care programs in Pennsylvania.
 
Recent reports from other states have cast a national spotlight on how lax review and oversight processes can allow fraud, improper payments, and misuse of public funds to proliferate within taxpayer-funded child care systems. These reports underscore the importance of ensuring that Pennsylvania’s programs are operating with strong controls, effective monitoring, and clear accountability to taxpayers and the General Assembly.
 
Every year, Pennsylvania appropriates more than $420 million in taxpayer funds for child care services, in addition to hundreds of millions of dollars in federal funding, for a total of more than a billion taxpayer dollars spent annually on child care.
 
Federal law requires states receiving Child Care and Development Fund (CCDF) dollars to review and report improper payments and error rates. The latest available data indicates an average improper payment rate of about 4 percent, representing tens of millions of taxpayer dollars each year. While Pennsylvania participates in these reviews, state-specific results are not routinely published or shared with the General Assembly, limiting transparency and informed oversight.
 
The latest three-month Department of Human Services report shows that OCDEL conducted 1,246 inspections, investigated 502 complaints, and took action against 21 illegally operating providers across multiple counties. However, comparable reports have not been published since 2022.
 
At the same time, child care services and costs have continued to grow, and taxpayers are funding care for some of Pennsylvania’s youngest and most vulnerable children. Greater transparency, oversight, and reporting are needed to ensure these public dollars are used efficiently and responsibly, and to ensure that honest, compliant child care providers are not disadvantaged by gaps in oversight or the diversion of limited funds away from legitimate services.
 
I invite you to join me in sponsoring this important legislation.