View Slots for Tots Report

Empty slots cost City $17.3 million annually

New York City Comptroller William C. Thompson, Jr. today released a study finding that the City's Agency for Child Development (ACD) routinely has allowed thousands of slots in City-funded childcare centers to remain empty while numerous, low-income parents await places for their children. Comptroller Thompson's study, titled "Slots For Tots", identified nearly 2,000 open slots across the City resulting from poor oversight and planning by ACD.

"It is a tragedy that day care spots would go unused when there are so many New York City parents who depend on the service to allow them to earn a living," Comptroller Thompson said. "The City must enroll children into these slots immediately."

The Comptroller analyzed ACD enrollment data from March 2002 to determine the extent of the problem. The City fully funds 344 daycare centers operated by sponsors who have contracts with ACD to provide care exclusively to publicly subsidized, low-income children.

Roughly 32,000 ACD children receive care through these centers, according to the Administration for Children's Services. City contracts provide a budget to the center based on the number of children the center has the capacity to serve.

"It is important to note that, unlike other types of care, fully-funded centers are paid based on their capacity and not the number of children actually enrolled or in attendance," the report said.

According to Thompson, this has amounted to millions of dollars in wasted funds, because many centers are being paid the full contract amount, but are underenrolled. This has occurred while roughly 46,800 children remain on ACD's waiting list for childcare, although the Citizens Committee for Children has estimated the real need for such service is more likely as high as 100,000 children.

Among the study's findings:

• 1,964 daycare slots were vacant out of the 33,678 fully-funded slots. Utilizing the $8,808 average cost per child for one year of care in a center, the Comptroller estimated the City spent roughly $17.3 million per year on empty slots.
  
  
• Vacancies are disproportionately located in a small number of centers. While only 70 centers - 21 percent of those in the Comptroller's analysis - were underenrolled by 10 percent or more, these programs held nearly 40 percent of the City's vacant slots. In some centers, up to 72 spaces were vacant, representing more than 50 percent of their capacity. Fourteen programs had more than 20 empty spaces. The differences highlight the great variation in enrollment status experienced from one center to the next.
  
  
• Every borough had a waiting list for fully-funded daycare. The Comptroller's analysis estimated the following: Brooklyn's waiting list of 6,697 was the largest of all boroughs, as was its number of daycare vacancies, at 830. In The Bronx, 1,628 awaited childcare assistance, and yet 347 slots were empty. In Manhattan, 1,367 awaited slots, while 415 spaces existed. Queens had 1,168 waiting and 289 vacancies. On Staten Island, 194 awaited assistance while 83 vacancies existed.
  
  
• Although ACD staff say they recommend that fully-funded childcare centers overenroll by 10 percent (in expectation of routine absences and families relocating), there is no written guideline. In fact, only 10.9 percent of centers citywide had met this goal. Only 46.8 percent of daycare centers were overenrolled at all.
  
  
• Nearly 94 percent of underenrolled centers also kept reservations despite numerous vacancies. One center, in fact, had 31 vacancies and 46 reservations.

To determine the root causes of the problem, Thompson's Office interviewed center directors and ACD staff, who reported that understaffing, largely due to mass retirements in recent years, led to persistent delays in determining whether children were eligible for daycare slots.

Additionally, some providers reported that ACD does not allow providers to complete new eligibility reviews when they are fully enrolled, meaning that centers do not complete basic paperwork before a slot opens up. That prevents a child from immediately receiving care when a vacancy occurs.

Further, providers reported that ACD does not communicate effectively and efficiently with the Human Resources Administration (HRA). They reported that when they care for HRA children, spaces sometimes are not properly accounted for in ACD's database records. That has led to inaccurate records with ACD unaware that some centers are at capacity.

Comptroller Thompson made several recommendations to address the problem:

• Investigate causes for underenrollment of daycare centers and develop a plan of action to address the causes.
  
  
• Improve the referral system at ACD to more efficiently direct children to centers with openings.
  
  
• ACD must review its operations to maximize enrollment, particularly in regard to eligibility requirements. The agency must also develop written guidelines on overenrollment.
  
  
• Communication between ACD and HRA must be improved.
  
  
• ACD must develop standard procedures for all Resource Areas, (ACD borough offices).
  

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