{"id":43676,"date":"2023-10-05T14:09:38","date_gmt":"2023-10-05T14:09:38","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/mochamber.com\/?p=43676"},"modified":"2023-10-05T14:11:44","modified_gmt":"2023-10-05T14:11:44","slug":"mid-missouri-legislators-and-business-leaders-discuss-child-care-crisis-and-solutions","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/mochamber.com\/news-archive\/mid-missouri-legislators-and-business-leaders-discuss-child-care-crisis-and-solutions\/","title":{"rendered":"Mid-Missouri legislators and business leaders discuss child care crisis and solutions"},"content":{"rendered":"
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On Wed., Oct. 4, legislators and business leaders gathered for a morning of networking and discussion on Missouri\u2019s child care crisis and its significant impact on employers and working families.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Nearly 75 people attended the forum at MU\u2019s Center for Family Policy and Research. The event was co-hosted by the Missouri Chamber of Commerce and Industry, University of Missouri, Columbia Chamber of Commerce and Jefferson City Area Chamber of Commerce.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

A panel discussion about the magnitude of the crisis and potential policy solutions kicked off the forum.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cEven though it\u2019s my personal choice if I use child care or not, this is really an economic matter,\u201d said Brenda Lohman, chair of Human Development and Family Science at the University of Missouri. \u201cIt\u2019s for the government, the university, for businesses to get together to try to problem solve how we can create workforce in the state of Missouri.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In 2021, the U.S. Chamber of Commerce Foundation and the Missouri Chamber released a report that showed Missouri misses out on an estimated $1.35 billion<\/strong> annually, including a $280 million annual loss in tax revenue, due to child care issues.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Among the panelists was Rep. Brenda Shields (R-St. Joseph), who sponsored child care tax credit legislation that had bipartisan support during the 2023 legislative session. Although the tax credit package stalled in the last week of the legislative session, Shields and other supporters have vowed to bring it back in 2024.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cI truly believe \u2013 and this is why I\u2019m passionate about this package and I\u2019m passionate about what we need to do \u2013 I think if we can solve the child care crisis in the state of Missouri, we\u2019ll be able to drive businesses to want to come here,\u201d Shields said.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Other speakers included Chris Riley, dean of the College of Education and Human Development at the University of Missouri, and Alex Tuttle, legislative budget director for Gov. Mike Parson.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cOn one hand, we\u2019re in a crisis. On the other hand, I\u2019m really excited that we\u2019ve got the people at the table who are interested in having these conversations in an area that we haven\u2019t historically had them,\u201d Riley said.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

On Wed., Oct. 4, legislators and business leaders gathered for a morning of networking and discussion on Missouri\u2019s child care crisis and its significant impact on employers and working families. […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":19,"featured_media":43679,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"templates\/_article-post.php","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"_seopress_robots_primary_cat":"none","om_disable_all_campaigns":false,"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"_uf_show_specific_survey":0,"_uf_disable_surveys":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[15,134],"tags":[],"acf":[],"aioseo_notices":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/mochamber.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/43676"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/mochamber.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/mochamber.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mochamber.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/19"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mochamber.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=43676"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/mochamber.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/43676\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":43685,"href":"https:\/\/mochamber.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/43676\/revisions\/43685"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mochamber.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/43679"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/mochamber.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=43676"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mochamber.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=43676"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mochamber.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=43676"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}