Paul Szmal: It is 8.15 on FLX Morning on Finger Lakes Newsradio as we continue. Cloudy skies, temperature at 53. Like to welcome my guest at this time, Tracy Travis is here. She's the Family Child Care Services Coordinator from Child and Family Resources. Tracy, good morning. How are you this morning?
Matrese Travis: Good morning. I am well. Thank you.
Paul Szmal: Tracy, I wanted to start by asking about the need for child care programs in the area. How critical is it right now?
Matrese Travis: It's pretty bad. We have lots of infants and toddlers that have no place to go. We've had a couple centers closed down. We have a bunch of seasoned providers that are retiring. So it's a huge need right now.
And there is a program called the Empire State Family Child Care Collaborative that is actually helping people who want to start or have already started their own family child care business in their home. So the Empire State Collaborative is for providers that are registered and licensed already that's home-based providers that offer them free playground software to help with all the business aspects.
If anybody is interested in being a provider, they can contact one of our offices and get transferred to me and I will help them through all of the steps of becoming registered and licensed and then they can sign up for the Empire State Collaborative and get those benefits as well. We also have grants through our CCR&R contract to assist people that want to get started with a home-based child care business that will assist them with the training required and getting supplies to meet health and safety requirements. And then there should be funds left over to assist with educational materials as well.
Paul Szmal: Wow. It sounds like a pretty comprehensive program.
Matrese Travis: I try. It's my passion. My home providers are my passion. And anybody that wants to start, I would love to work with them.
Paul Szmal: What is the application process like? How extensive is it if somebody wanted to start a child care business in their home?
Matrese Travis: I'm not going to lie. It is a lot, but I will help them all the way through. So they have to go onto the OCFS website and do the videos and request the application. They need to sign up for health and safety training, which I am a health and safety trainer. They have to have CPR, which I help them with that as well because I'm a Red Cross certified health and safety, or excuse me, CPR instructor. So it is a lot. There's a lot of background checks and things, but I will help anybody that wants to go through it. And then we also have our registrars in-house that will assist with paperwork as well.
Paul Szmal: Is there other training besides the videos and the CPR training that's required?
Matrese Travis: The health and safety is a 15-hour training. I offer it quarterly right here in our Penn Yan office, and I offer it on Friday and Saturday all day.
Paul Szmal: We're talking with Tracy Travis from Child and Family Resources. She's the Family Child Care Services Coordinator. What do people need to consider when they're thinking about using their home space and converting that into a child care business?
Matrese Travis: Well, we want it to stay home-based. That's the perk of being a home-based provider. It's a home environment. We have to take into consideration safety, which all homes should have these safety things in place. There's a few extras, having smoke detectors, carbon monoxide detectors, but again, all homes should have this stuff already.
Paul Szmal: What about insurance requirements? I imagine that's something that you really need to be careful with and look extensively into.
Matrese Travis: The Tom Copeland website has got you covered for that as well. He lists on his website all the insurance providers that are out there. Many of my providers have just added an additional clause on their home insurance already, so that's not really a huge hurdle.
Paul Szmal: I know there's background checks involved and some regulation requirements, some documentation as well. Is there an approximate time frame that you can put on this whole process from start to finish?
Matrese Travis: We're looking at about 90 days, so again, I'm there to assist with anything the providers need, so it can go very quickly.
Paul Szmal: Yeah, it sounds like it. I would have thought this would have taken more than three months to get through, but that's a pretty accelerated time frame actually.
Matrese Travis: It is, yes. That's probably a good thing, given the fact that we have such a critical need for family child care in the area right now.
Paul Szmal: As we mentioned too, there's that Empire State Family Child Care Collaborative that those that are registered and licensed can join in. The application for that only takes a few minutes online.
Matrese Travis: Yep, it takes five minutes, and I'm right with you for that as well. And then the playground, I've been on a couple of meetings with the providers that have started already. The playground representatives walk you through everything, setting that up. So I think we've got our ducks in a row here.
Paul Szmal: Yeah, it sounds like it certainly, and that playground software sounds like it's been a tremendous addition, taking care of the business aspects of running a family child care business.
Matrese Travis: Yes, it's got sign in, sign out. You can do curriculums on there. You can do all of your expenses on there. It's got a program to figure out your time space, which you need to figure out expenses that are both personal and business. It's a wonderful program.
Paul Szmal: And there's even some individual and group coaching involved as part of this whole child care collaborative too.
Matrese Travis: Yep, that's where I'm there with you. I'm there with you all the way through for the home-based providers.
Paul Szmal: So give me an idea of how you think we may be, maybe in the next six months, in the next 12 months. I mean, how many more child care centers do we need to have open? Do you have an idea, a number that maybe we could throw out?
Matrese Travis: There is room for everyone for home-based, room for all. I have a couple that have just gotten registered, and they had a waiting list, waiting on them to finish the process. So if anybody's scared that they won't get full, that's not going to happen. And then we also have our referral process as well, that families call and get referred to our home providers and our centers as well.
Paul Szmal: And by the way, I want to mention that the info sessions on the Empire State Family Child Care Collaborative, the next session is going to be coming up. It's a Zoom session from 6 to 7 p.m. on November the 4th, and then it's going to be offered again on December the 2nd. And again, this is for people that are registered and licensed already as family child care centers.
Matrese Travis: Correct.
Paul Szmal: And then we're also having an info lunch session that CFR is covering lunch for everybody this Saturday at the HUD building in Geneva from 1230 to 330. And what will be covered in that informational session?
Matrese Travis: It just covers all of the benefits of the playground system and joining the Empire State Collaborative. And then lunch as well, because, you know, lunch is good.
Paul Szmal: Yeah, yeah, lunch is good, absolutely. So you seem to be pretty optimistic that we're going to be able to turn the corner here on what seems to be an ongoing problem.
Matrese Travis: I hope so. I'm taking phone calls from providers, about one a week, on people wanting to start. Some decide to follow through, others decide it's not for them, but I walk you through all of the information on all of the daycare-type programs that are out there.
Paul Szmal: And really, the most critical need is what, for infants and toddlers?
Matrese Travis: Yes, infants and toddlers, because each home-based provider can only keep two infants.
Paul Szmal: Wow. So, yep.
Matrese Travis: Yeah.
Paul Szmal: Yeah, okay. Okay, did not realize that. So yeah, that means that you really need to have a high volume to be able to handle a demand.
Matrese Travis: Yes.
Paul Szmal: Okay. Tracy, if people want to find out more information about what we've talked about here this morning, how do they reach out to you?
Matrese Travis: They can call any of our offices, and they can be transferred to me directly.
Paul Szmal: Okay. The main website, by the way, is cfresources.org, cfresources.org, and the number to the child care referral line is toll-free. It's 800-881-5786. It's 800-881-5786, so that you have that information.
Tracy, thank you very much for joining us and filling us in this morning, and I hope that we are able to get more people involved in family child care businesses in the home to help take care of the need.
Matrese Travis: Absolutely. Thank you so much.
Paul Szmal: Yeah, no problem.
It is 826 now on FLX Morning.
