Denver7 reports that Denver parents are getting crushed by childcare costs, long waitlists and a shortage of available spots while Mayor Mike Johnston’s response is a new task force aimed at “childcare for all.” The problem is immediate. The pilot is not. According to the article, the earliest concrete pilot is still roughly a year away.
One mother told Denver7 she started calling daycares as soon as she knew she would be raising her son in Colorado, searched within an hour of home and was willing to drive 45 minutes. Her son still did not get into a program until he was about 1. Now the family pays roughly $76 per day, per child, four days a week, plus fees. She summed up City Hall’s grand new childcare era with five brutally honest words: “It’s still very expensive.”
That is the gap. Parents are making second-mortgage calculations at the kitchen table. Providers are closing, workers are leaving, hours are shrinking and infant rooms fill almost immediately. Denver’s answer is a listening tour, future recommendations and a pilot next year. Nothing soothes a panicked parent like knowing a task force will eventually circle back with stakeholder feedback.
The Bullet Point Brief
- Denver has roughly 31,000 children under age 4 and fewer than 5,000 licensed childcare slots, according to numbers cited by Mayor Johnston. That is not a minor shortage. That is musical chairs with 26,000 kids left standing.
- Families are paying an average of about $25,000 per child each year. At that price, daycare should include ski lessons, orthodontics and a small ownership stake in the building.
- Parents are joining five or six waitlists while still pregnant and sometimes finding nothing. The city knows this. The providers know this. The parents certainly know this. Apparently, the only people still gathering information are the people holding the microphones.
- Johnston’s new Haynes-Gary Task Force will study costs, workforce needs, options and red tape, followed by a listening tour and a pilot next year. Denver has once again discovered that the best way to avoid solving a problem is to admire it in committee form.
- The one immediate step was eliminating a duplicative local licensing fee that ranged from $25 to $200. Fine. Good. Also roughly equivalent to treating a house fire by removing one scented candle.
My Bottom Line
Childcare is not a fake problem. It is a full-blown family crisis. Parents are deciding whether one of them should quit working because the cost of care can swallow a paycheck whole. Providers are trying to deliver high-quality care while labor, licensing and operating costs keep climbing. This is serious, and the families interviewed by Denver7 are not props. They are the evidence.
That is exactly why Denver’s response is so irritating. City Hall loves the language of universal salvation. “Childcare for all” sounds heroic on a stage. It fits nicely on a banner. But when asked what changes for families this year, the mayor pointed to a process. Listen. Design. Pilot. Scale. By the time the PowerPoint reaches its final form, half the toddlers in question may be applying for middle school.
Denver’s governing class keeps confusing motion with help. A task force is not a childcare slot. A listening tour does not lower a bill. A slogan does not hire a teacher. Parents do not need another visioning exercise led by task-force goblins sharpening their slide decks. They need more providers, fewer barriers, a bigger workforce and relief that arrives before another year of invoices does.
The obvious question remains: if City Hall already knows childcare is crushing families, why is the solution still a year away from even becoming a pilot? Politicians love promising “universal” anything because the applause comes immediately and the accountability gets buried later. Denver parents deserve better than compassionate branding wrapped around bureaucratic fog.
Source: Denver 7
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