The Learning Curve: Supe Wants Free Child Care – All She Needs Is $2 Billion

Over the past year, free-day care-mania has been sweeping the nation. 

It’s not hard to see why. Child care is one of the steepest ongoing costs of having children, and it has only been increasing. Over the past decade, the price has increased by nearly a quarter in California, meaning the average family now pays nearly $1,700 a month. That’s if families can even find child care in crowded markets like San Diego. 

Nationwide, some leaders are working to change that dynamic. Mayors Daniel Lurie and Zohran Mamdani, of San Francisco and New York City, respectively, have advanced plans to launch free child care programs in their cities. Earlier this year, New Mexico became the first state in the nation to adopt a free, universal child care program for its residents. 

Now, San Diego Unified Superintendent Fabiola Bagula wants to get in on the action. But it won’t be cheap – or easy. 

“I just keep going, ‘Well, why not here? What makes them different than us?’ We’re totally capable. If it’s America’s Finest City, then let’s make it that way,” Bagula said. “Other cities are already doing this. There’s models for this. We wouldn’t have to be doing this in the dark.” 

To Bagula, free child care could be a game changer for local families. While paying tens of thousands of dollars a year on care is a weight on parents’ backs, so is the stress that comes from figuring out how to navigate the world of child care. Bagula said even she and her husband, two working professionals, felt bogged down in it. 

“Where would we be if our young families didn’t have that added stress? If they knew there was a place where they can have the support of a community raising children together and being mutually responsible,” Bagula said. 

This new venture is part of a larger effort by district leaders to expand access to child care. Trustee Shana Hazan, for example, has been a primary driver of a more than doubling of after-school care slots in recent years. She’s described this effort as trying to align the school day, which often ends at 2:30 p.m., with working parents’ typical workday, which often doesn’t end until 5 p.m. 

But beyond personal factors, Bagula thinks a program of this magnitude could be a boon for the city. 

The Child Care Dollars and Cents 

San Diego has for years relied on immigrants for growth, because under the surface, local populations have been shrinking. Demographers attribute that shrinkage primarily to the region’s high cost of living chasing residents to other regions in search of greater affordability and a slumping local birth rate. Taking the high cost of child care off of residents’ financial plates could ease those dual stressors and produce a more stable local population.  

“I actually think it would give back to the city. If a family is saving that amount of money, they’re going to spend it again in the city,” Bagula said. 

If may also help San Diego Unified as a district. That’s because district leaders have tied those two factors back to its creeping, systemwide enrollment decline. Over the past decade enrollment at the district has dropped by about 12 percent, and statewide experts expect it to continue. That trend poses serious risks to the future of schools across the city, which may face closure if the declines continue as they’re projected to. 

But it may also present some interesting opportunities. San Diego Unified leaders have already gotten the ball rolling on converting some unused district-owned land into educator workforce housing. Bagula thinks additional school space could be turned into child care. Bagula has also been having ongoing discussions with leaders at SAY San Diego, a local nonprofit that operates day care facilities locally, about partnering on the initiative. 

“We have the space and SAY San Diego can actually do the training and the hiring of people. They also know the logistics of licensing,” Bagula said. 

Even given the tentative partnership, Bagula stressed that this effort is still in its infancy – and there are no shortage of challenges. One is figuring out how to roll out a comprehensive system that includes, rather than obliterates, private child care providers already cannibalized by the statewide rollout of transitional kindergarten. 

Then there’s also another larger, multi-billion-dollar elephant in the room – the program’s estimated cost. Bagula projects the citywide child care system she’s like to see could carry a price tag of about $2 billion. That’s no small chunk of change, even for California’s second largest school district. It’s nearly $700 million more than the district’s general fund revenue for this school year. 

That means the district can’t go it alone. In recent months, Bagula said she’s been talking to anyone who will listen to her about the free child care dream. That includes folks like representatives from the California Endowment, Congressmember Sara Jacobs and Councilmember Sean Elo-Rivera.  

Bagula is still tinkering with what steps to take to get the ball rolling. That may mean starting small by offering child care in individual neighborhoods or creating an affordable model rather than a free one. In any case, a big check from a philanthropist would help. 

Bagula has been encouraged by the conversations she’s had already, but she acknowledges that she’s been speaking to boosters of the concept rather than critics. But boosters alone won’t be enough. The tallest order may be getting buy-in from the general public. 

“I’m going to need everyone in San Diego’s help to pull this off,” Bagula said. “I see it as an investment in San Diego. I think it’s a beautiful way to invest in young families.” 

San Diego Unified’s Union Battles 

There’s been a lot going on at San Diego Unified’s teachers union. Over the past three weeks, conflicts that long simmered under the surface burst into the public. Some teachers union members accused San Diego Education Association President Kyle Weinberg of misleading them. The heads of other district unions, meanwhile, claimed he left them out in the cold during negotiations.  

My initial story dropped in the middle of two SDEA votes – an election for union leadership and a vote on whether to approve a tentative agreement many had pointed to as contributing to the layoffs of some district employees. We now know how those votes ended up. 

• On the leadership election front, Weinberg fell short of the 50 percent threshold needed to win outright. He will advance to a run off with current Vice President Monique Barrett. A handful of Barrett’s allies have also advanced to runoffs. 
• Even given the acknowledgement that the plum benefits of the tentative agreement were likely to blame for the layoff of their colleagues, 93 percent of district teachers voted to approve the contract. It grants them protections against layoffs, five percent raises over the next two years, stipends for special education staff working over caseload limits and an end to the unpopular practice of excessing teachers. While the results of the leadership election weren’t ideal for Weinberg, the contract vote shows teachers support the agreements he helped negotiate. 

But that wasn’t all. Last week, we reported that the union’s board voted to approve a resolution of no-confidence in Weinberg. The resolution stated that he’s engaged in “a pattern of decisions being made without required board approval, undermining the authority of this board.”   

Given the upcoming runoff election, the resolution comes at a politically inopportune time for Weinberg. Weinberg, meanwhile, projected confidence in the face of the board’s lack of it. 

“I’ve always attempted to operate according to our SDEA governance documents that require that we are a democratic union and that I act as president in a transparent and inclusive manner,” Weinberg said. “While I do make mistakes, I own those mistakes and try to rectify them.”  

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