Equitable Access to Childcare: Mapping as a Tool for Planning and Policy

• In Event: Equitable Access to Childcare: Tools and Solutions

Abstract

BACKGROUND: Supply, cost, quality, hours of operation and equity remain intractable challenges to the U.S. childcare system. Although 65% of young children need care because their parent(s) work (Bureau of Labor Statistics, 2019), half of US census tracts are childcare deserts with three or more children potentially competing for each childcare seat (Malik et al., 2018). Inequities in various aspects of childcare access such as availability, affordability, and enrollment rates are associated with family income, ethnicity, single parenthood, and rural vs. urban location (Child Care Aware of America, 2018; Davis, Lee & Sojourner, 2019; Malik et al.; National Academies, 2018).

Equitable deployment of childcare resources requires accurate data on where the needs are greatest. We used a family-centered spatial analysis to measure and visualize two aspects of childcare access and test the hypothesis that access is associated with neighborhood demographic characteristics.

METHODS: A two-step floating catchment area method was used to measure spatial access and affordability of licensed childcare centers within a 3-mile driving distance from a prototypical family home in Honolulu County (population 968,999). We approximated residential location using a dasymetric mapping technique involving residential housing unit and child population data. Data sources were the state childcare licensing database (center location, capacity, and cost), the American Community Survey (young child population estimates), and commercially available geodata on residential housing unit and roads.

Spatial access was the sum of capacity-to-population ratios of all ECE providers within a three-mile driving distance of a family’s home, i.e., the likelihood of a child being accommodated given completion for nearby seats. Affordability was the average availability-weighted tuition of a childcare seat, expressed as a percentage of the median family income in this same catchment area. These accessibility indices were measured at the micro-level (i.e. residential lot) and can be summarized at different user-defined geographic levels. We chose to summarize access at the census tract to approximate a neighborhood context.

RESULTS/CONCLUSIONS: Maps of the spatial access and affordability indexes show clear differences across neighborhoods (see Figure 1). Countywide, 64% of children lived in childcare deserts (index score of 0.3 or lower); 62% lived in communities where care was not affordable (costing 8% or more of the median neighborhood family income), and 32% lived in high need areas (both a childcare desert and unaffordable). To quantify (dis)equity, we regressed the two access indexes on tract-level demographic characteristics (see Table 1). Spatial access was greater for densely populated and majority white neighborhoods, and lower for predominantly Native Hawaiian neighborhoods. Affordability was higher for wealthy neighborhoods and lower for those that were densely populated or had a high percentage of Native Hawaiian families.

Metrics based on a radius around a family’s home provide an authentic estimate of resource availability from a family perspective (Davis, Lee & Sojourner). Data of this nature also support informed community advocacy and planning/deployment of childcare resources. The techniques are flexible and can be scaled up or down to address smaller or larger geographic areas. Discussion will focus on applications to planning and policy.

Authors

• Barbara D DeBaryshe, University of Hawaiʻi at Mānoa
  Presenting Author

• Javzandulam Azuma, University of Hawaii
  Non-Presenting Author

• Kathleen Gauci, University of Hawaii at Manoa
  Non-Presenting Author

• Ivette Rodriguez Stern, University of Hawaii - Center on the Family
  Non-Presenting Author