On Tuesday, June 27, Governor Brown signed the 2017/18 State Budget. This year’s agreement fulfills the multi-year reimbursement rate deal which was agreed to in the 2016/17 State Budget.
Though the Governor had paused the increases in the original January proposal, in the May Revision he reinstated those rate agreements which included both annualization of last year’s rates and included additional augmentations for this fiscal year to both the SRR and RMR. Specifically, these will include:
• Annualizing the RMR increases from 2014 which was implemented in January 2017. In addition, it provides funding to increase the RMR to the 75th Percentile of the 2016 survey on January 1, 2018. The budget provides ongoing hold harmless language which carries into December of 2018.
• Annualizes the SRR Increase from last year’s agreement to the full 10% and adds an additional 6% increase in the 2017/18 Budget. These changes will be effective July 1, 2017
• Provides funding for additional State Preschool Slots. These funds will be made available to LEA’s to provide full or part day preschool programs. If they do not apply, the RFP will be opened for part day preschool programs for non-LEA providers.
Initial contracts from CDE were not reflective of any of these increases and will all receive Budget Act Augmentations based on the new agreement. For Stage 2 and 3 these will be done with ongoing caseload cost adjustments.
After much collaborative work across the state, the state budget also included the other Alliance Budget Priorities including:
• Adoption of the increased SMI and 12 Month Eligibility as outlined in AB60 – the new eligibility will be 70% of the current SMI with an exit at 85% of the SMI. The increased SMI will be effective July 1, 2017. CDE will be issuing new eligibility guidelines along with a new family fee chart in Early July (7/10 Proposed) 12 Month Eligibility Guidelines will be developed and provided to the field by CDE in the next couple of months.
• Adopts the Foster Care/Child Care Bridge Program Starting January 1, 2018 ongoing in the following year. This is a County Optional Program with a $15.6 Million Allocation in Year 1 and $31 Million ongoing.
Trailer Bill Language
• A compromise was reached to creates a workgroup led by the LAO to review Title 22 Licensing requirements rather than adopt the Governor’s proposal to exempt LEA run State Preschool from Title 22. The work group must report back to the legislature by March of 2018 and the legislature then has until July 2019 to either adopt the recommendations of the workgroup or allow the exemption for the LEA’s to move forward.
• The Budget rejected the attempt to increase adult to child rations in State Preschool to 1-12.
• Provides a COLA at 1.56% for the capped child care programs including AP and R&R
• Assess a -.40% Negative Growth Factor to General Child Care, AP and Migrant Programs.
Discussions are already in process with both CDE and CDSS on implementation of these changes and now the real work begins. Unfortunately, there were no new slots allocated to serve children in either AP or General Child Care.
If you have any questions, feel free to contact CCRC’s Director of Government Relations, Donna Sneeringer at [email protected].