Council Member Restler Questions Brooklyn CAC Relocation and Voucher Waitlist

Uh, we've been joined also by Councilmember Brewer, and we'll go on to Councilmember Ressler, followed by Gutierrez.

Great.

Um Thank you.

Congratulations, Commissioner.

It's good to see the ACS team this morning.

Um, I will just note uh it building on Councilmember Epstein for a second, the CAC in Brooklyn is moving.

We've received no communication about that, so would appreciate a briefing on what's planned and where that's going.

It's in our district, it's an important location, and we really want to make sure that that is handled thoughtfully.

And with that, I'm gonna switch the topic that your team knows I'm gonna ask about, which is vouchers.

Um building on Councilmember Ose's questions, uh, just to affirm there are 25,000 children currently on the voucher waiting list.

So first of all, absolutely um commitment to follow-up related to the CAC um question that you have, and then I'll turn it over to this.

Yes, based on the report from last Friday, 25,600.

25,600 children desperately in need of child care who do not have it today and with no plans right now to provide any funding to the families on the wait list.

I want to be clear, I obviously share your concern and want to get care to as many families as possible.

However, there are families on the wait list that are actively engaged in care, especially with New York City public schools.

We keep those children on the wait list because if and when we are able to offer them a voucher, we want them to have the choice of type of care.

So you mentioned earlier that your team and others across the administration are doing outreach to folks on the wait list to connect them to 2K seats and after school programs.

Have you quantified how many families have been successfully connected from the wait list to other child care options?