Foundation Gives $750,000 to Expand and Improve Child Care Facilities

April 7, 2004 — The Freddie Mac Foundation recently awarded a new three-year, $750,000 grant to the Local Initiatives Support Corporation (LISC) to help address the growing need for child care facilities in low-income communities. Through its Community Investment Collaborative for Kids (CICK) program, LISC works at the federal, state and local levels to generate new sources of capital for child care facility construction and renovation. The program has helped create 96 new child care facilities for nearly 9,000 low-income children nationwide.

“We are pleased to continue our support of LISC’s CICK program,” explained Maxine B. Baker, president and CEO, Freddie Mac Foundation. “Access to quality child care is essential for families. At the Foundation, we recognize that providing child care is an important part of our goal to strengthen families and communities. The CICK program is ensuring that more parents can make a living while knowing that their children are learning in a safe, nurturing environment.”

The new commitment follows a series of grants that the Freddie Mac Foundation has made to LISC since 1994, when CICK was organized.

“The continuing support of the Freddie Mac Foundation enables us to expand our focus on improving child care facilities, which is an essential component of community revitalization,” said Michael Rubinger, president and CEO of LISC. “The new grant supports our efforts to go beyond the bricks and mortar of affordable housing and to rebuild the social and economic fabric of low-income communities.”

LISC, the nation’s leading nonprofit community development support organization, created CICK as a specialized vehicle to address the shortage of child care facilities in low-income communities. Virtually all low-income communities face a severe shortage of appropriate child care facilities, a crisis that is getting worse as increasing numbers of parents and welfare recipients enter the workforce. Physical space is too scarce or unaffordable. Existing child care programs are most often located in inadequate and temporary quarters that were never designed for this purpose. CICK offers a comprehensive strategy for expanding the supply of quality child care centers in low-income communities.

Previous grants from the Freddie Mac Foundation enabled LISC, through its CICK program, to assist child care providers in obtaining $14.4 million in loans and grants that have helped 96 facilities to provide new or improved space for nearly 9,000 low-income children. The funding has supported a pilot initiative to help enhance the quality of several early childhood centers serving low-income children throughout New York City. Freddie Mac Foundation funding has also helped CICK take a leadership role in successfully placing the issue of facilities supply and quality in front of lawmakers and policymakers.