April 03, 2013
Voices’ Thoughts on Virginia’s Child Care Development Fund Plan
In the field of early childhood, we plan. And we learn that our plans don’t always fully take shape, but we keep planning to move the issue forward. One important plan that we can use to guide our policy work … Continue reading
March 01, 2013
2013 GA Session Wrap Up: Early Care and Education
Although the General Assembly’s agenda was not bursting at the seams with early care and education issues this year, it still took a significant amount of attention. This year more legislators than ever before understood the value of early childhood, … Continue reading
February 27, 2013
Update: 2013 General Assembly Child Welfare Bills (03/27/13)
During the 2013 General Assembly session, Voices led the charge (with critical support from our partners over at the Virginia Poverty Law Center) on several child welfare bills aimed at improving stability and opportunity for children entering, at-risk of entering … Continue reading
February 25, 2013
Budget Approved by General Assembly
What’s In It For Kids? This past Saturday was a busy day in Richmond with both the House and Senate tying up all of the loose ends of the 2013 Session and wanting to adjourn on time. Not to get … Continue reading
February 19, 2013
Don’t let Virginia’s families slide in to sequestration
As the end of February looms we are hearing more of that dreaded, awful word- “sequestration”. What is sequestration? It is a provision of the federal budget, that unless new revenue is found, or other targeted cuts are made, discretionary … Continue reading
February 18, 2013
New Info on the Status of Child Well-Being in Virginia
Voices/KIDS COUNT’s new report “Status Report: Child Well-Being in Virginia January 2013” profiles five domains of child well-being: poverty/economic security, early childhood, health, education and child welfare/safety. Each domain contains reliable data on a set of indicators, many of which … Continue reading
February 15, 2013
New Report: VA CHILDREN LIVING IN POVERTY
Voices/KIDS COUNT has a new report “Virginia Children in Poverty: 2006-2010″. Growing up in poverty puts children at risk of a host of negative outcomes. Children from poor and low-income families are much more likely to live in neighborhoods of … Continue reading
February 14, 2013
Your Action is Needed on the State Budget!
The House and Senate have each passed their version of the budget and rejected the other chamber’s. They have named their top negotiators, called budget conferees, to work out the differences between the two versions of the budget in a … Continue reading
February 14, 2013
Virginia is poised to benefit from the proposed federal early education plan
The president’s proposal seeks to expand access to preschool for low- to moderate- income four year old children (those in families up to 200% poverty- $38,180 gross yearly income for a family of three). Virginia currently provides opportunities for … Continue reading
February 08, 2013
Update on House and Senate Budgets
Here you’ll find some highlights of how our budget-related legislative agenda issues fared in both the House and Senate budgets so far this session… Children’s Mental Health Expanding Crisis Services and Child Psychiatry Voices’ Campaign for Children’s Mental Health requested … Continue reading