Military child care centers see varying effects from personnel actions

The Trump administration’s efforts to cut the number of federal workers, including a hiring freeze, have resulted in various impacts on military child care centers, including the closure of one, according to service officials.

The child development center at Hill Air Force Base, Utah, has closed. No other centers have closed at Air Force, Army, Navy or Marine Corps bases, officials said, in response to Military Times’ questions.

Child development centers “traditionally face high turnover, and several recent departures in conjunction with the hiring freeze reduced the number of supervisors and trainers” at Hill AFB, Air Force officials stated. Air Force child development centers are staffed with employees paid by appropriated funds, which are taxpayer dollars, as well as non-appropriated funds.

Although military child and youth programs were exempted from the hiring freeze in mid-March, there was uncertainty when the freeze was first implemented. As a result, some child care centers have struggled to recover from those initial pauses in hiring. The country has long faced a shortage of child care workers.

The Air Force now has an exemption for its child care centers from the Defense Department hiring freeze, but the hiring, on-boarding and training process takes time, officials said.

The Air Force’s appropriated-fund employees weren’t exempt from the Deferred Resignation Program, which allowed some Defense Department civilians to resign while receiving full pay and benefits through September.

The impact on child care centers, if any, varies from installation to installation, Air Force officials said. It also depends on how quickly the centers can hire new personnel.

At Peterson Space Force Base in Colorado, officials will close one of their infant rooms on Friday because of the staffing issues, said a Space Base Delta 1 spokesperson. The closure is necessary to maintain an appropriate ratio of caregivers for children, to ensure the children’s safety and well being, the spokesperson said.

“We are working through hiring freeze exemptions as quickly as possible,” he said, adding that the base would work with affected families to return to the main CDC as quickly as possible.

Peterson officials asked eight families to voluntarily transfer their infants to an off-base, licensed, accredited child care center at no additional cost, through their Community Contracted Child Care program. Peterson launched the program in 2023 to address the high demand for child care at the base, and through March of this year, had reduced the waitlist by 150 children.

That’s one example of initiatives the services have implemented over the past several years to increase the availability of child care for military families.

Their efforts to recruit and retain more child care workers have had a positive impact on staffing levels, Air Force officials said.

“This has enabled us to better navigate staffing challenges this year and maintain consistent care for the children of our airmen and guardians,” officials said.

Among other things, those initiatives include bonuses for employees based on their longevity and other factors, and a 100% child-care fee discount for the first enrolled child of direct-care staff. They also receive a 25% discount for additional enrolled children. Since these initiatives were implemented, the Air Force increased the staff of those providing direct care to children by more than 20%, officials said.

Navy child care hasn’t been significantly affected by the personnel moves, service officials said. Most employees of Navy child and youth programs are paid by non-appropriated funds and were exempted from participating in the Deferred Resignation Program.

There was “a bit of a hiccup” at the beginning of the hiring freeze, however, when it wasn’t clear whether it applied to non-appropriated fund workers, said Destiny Sibert, spokesperson for Commander, Navy Installations Command headquarters. Some programs had to adjust their hours, but operations should be back soon to full staffs, she said.

Navy officials have also been working to increase the amount of child care over the last several years, reducing the wait list for child development centers and school age care by half since fiscal 2023, from 5,000 to 2,500. By implementing salary increases, recruitment incentives and child care discounts for employees, they increased the staffing levels to 88%.