ALBUQUERQUE — It takes a village to raise 9-month-old Angélica De La Cruz.
The girl’s mother, Magnolia De La Cruz, works at her mother’s home-based daycare, where she is able to look after her daughter and other children. Still, the 25-year-old single mother said her bills often leave her struggling to break even, and she relies heavily on her parents for groceries, rent and car payments when she cannot make ends meet.
De La Cruz is one of many early childhood workers in New Mexico struggling to make a living wage. To rally support for the problem, she joined roughly 50 caregivers, advocates and providers on Monday at a daycare center to push state officials to implement a fair framework for pay and career advancement.
“It will really be helpful if we actually get that implemented, because we will be getting more money, and we could save a little bit more and actually pay everything without asking for help,” De La Cruz said.
On Monday, educators gathered under blue and yellow posters stating, “Universal childcare only works if you pay early educators living wages.” Some of the audience members at the event wore white shirts reading, “We demand a universal childcare system … with thriving wages for early childhood educators.”
Gabriela Campos/The New Mexican
Joining advocates and workers was Democratic gubernatorial candidate Deb Haaland, a former U.S. interior secretary and congresswoman who weeks ago earned the endorsement of advocacy organization OLÉ New Mexico, the organizers of Monday’s event. Haaland said she struggled to access childcare when she was a younger, single mother and emphasized the importance of New Mexico properly supporting childcare workers in building a universal system.
“It’s important that they have a living wage, that they can count on benefits from the state that will ensure that they can get accessible healthcare — that they, too, can put a meal on the table for their own families and pay the rent or mortgage in the same month,” she said. “That was nearly impossible for me at some times in my life.”
They gathered as part of a national event known as the Day Without Child Care, during which childcare centers in the state and around the country temporarily close in an effort to push policymakers to provide affordable childcare that is also sustainable for providers.
Gabriela Campos/The New Mexican
In New Mexico, where Gov. Michelle Lujan Grisham has launched a system designed to provide access to free childcare to every family, advocates have focused their attention on calling for fairer wages for workers, many of whom make $15 per hour and see no path forward for sustainable career growth.
Advocates have expressed concerns that the state would not fully implement a wage and career ladder for months. Many have highlighted an appropriation set aside by lawmakers in the state’s budget for the coming fiscal year that originally would have carved out $60 million to fund workers’ wage increases through the framework.
However, Lujan Grisham in March used her ability to veto specific language in the state budget to strike the words “wage increases” and other key phrasing, fueling advocates’ concerns that the $60 million would not flow directly to workers’ paychecks.
Gabriela Campos/The New Mexican
“We are not getting the dignity [or] wage and career ladder that we need,” advocate Raymundo De La Cruz said during the event.
Officials at the early childhood department, though, have maintained that the reimbursement rates that flow to childcare providers through the state’s universal care program allow them to grant workers the raises they seek. Those reimbursement rates raise the wage floor for workers to $18 per hour or higher, though providers are expected to meet more requirements, like staying open for more hours.
The Early Childhood Education and Care Department also asserted Monday that the $60 million would be directly used for workers’ wage scale.
“This is clearly mandated in the law (HB2) that states that $60M of the Early Childhood Education and Care Department budget will support the wage and career ladder for educators through established child care assistance rates,” Cabinet Secretary Elizabeth Groginsky wrote in a statement. “The Lujan Grisham administration fully intends to adhere to the letter of the law.”
She added the state is also working to develop the wage and career ladder educators and advocates seek. A working group examining the administrative structure, monitoring and other factors essential to implementing the ladder started meeting in March and has a goal of providing recommendations in August, Groginsky said.
Finally, she highlighted a yearslong commitment by the state to improving reimbursement rates for childcare providers and compensation for workers, noting that since the department’s inception in 2020, “median child care wages in New Mexico have grown by 65% — a higher rate of growth than any other state in the country.”
“New Mexico, under the leadership of Governor Lujan Grisham and the commitment and investments of the New Mexico legislature, are building a system designed to pay educators fair wages and make quality care accessible for all families who need it,” she wrote.