Children's Council San Francisco

Children's Council connects 5,000+ children a year to quality early care and education. As administrators of our local child care subsidy system on behalf of the California Department of Social Services and the City & County of San Francisco, we help families qualify for financial aid for child care or preschool. This program serves our children experiencing trauma (homelessness, neglect, abuse, hunger, etc.) and children from families living in poverty. Children's Council documents family eligibility and pays care providers based upon hours of care. In 23/24, in partnership with the San Francisco Department of Early Childhood, we ensured access to child care through the Early Learning for All system, and operated a fair wage structure through the Workforce Compensation Initiative, issuing $106 million in child care tuition payments and wage enhancements to early educators.

Today, San Francisco only has enough licensed child care for 16% of our infants and toddlers. In order to increase the supply of quality care options available for families, Children's Council's Thriving Workforce model supports new and prospective early educators to get the support they need to join and stay in the field. We offer a variety of training, coaching, and technical assistance for child care providers via our BizNest suite of services. More than 1,200 early educators received training, technical assistance and/or start-up grants through our signature BizNest program, the Family Child Care Business Incubator, leading to the creation of 970+ new child care spots. 300+ home-based child care businesses receive technical assistance to navigate the Early Learning For All system to serve children with subsidies. Our Health and Nutrition Department supported 230+ FCC's in San Francisco and San Mateo counties through the USDA Child Care Food Program, providing financial reimbursement for serving in excess of 899,000 healthy meals and snacks to the 1,800 children in their care. 89% of programs reported improved nutrition and physical activity practices in their child care environments by participating in the "Healthy Apple" program, which includes a self-assessment, information, training, and additional resources. Our targeted supports to Black/African American individuals include an Early Childhood Educator Career Development Pipeline program that has graduated 111 to secure a teaching license and job placement in an early education classroom, to start a child care business, or continue their education.

Children's Council acts as a steward of public funds for programs that strive to improve access to and the quality of child care available in San Francisco. Children's Council serves as fiscal intermediary for the Department of Early Childhood (formerly First 5 San Francisco and the Office of Early Care & Education) to disburse $48 million in Early Learning For All funds to local child care programs, and to support the work of community-based organizations throughout our community.

Parents/caregivers of children come to us to find child care, secure financial aid, learn about child development, connect to peer support or other social services, and to receive concrete supports like diapers, books, toys and more. The Children's Council Child Care Resource and Referral team helps thousands of families find child care and other family resources that meet their needs through one-on-one counseling and access to a comprehensive online child care search engine. Our Subsidy Administration team helps low-income families navigate complicated government financial aid programs and helps them connect to other community resources. Our PlayLab programs support adults in learning how to be a child's first educator and provide opportunities for parents and caregivers to develop peer support networks. Our child development tips were shared via 12,000+ texts to subscribed parent/caregivers. Our Parent Voices chapter brings together dozens of families from all of our programs to build strong support networks and leadership skills that enable them to be advocates for an improved early care and education system in California and beyond. Finally, we host an annual City Kids Family Fair to help hundreds of families connect to resources that support their children's early care and education.