The Whatcom County Executive’s Office failure for nearly a year to approve funding for child care provider credentialing and career development is amplifying concerns about the county’s ability to meet child care needs.
Updated April 23, 2025
Since Whatcom County voters passed the Healthy Children’s Fund — also known as Proposition 5 — by just 20 votes in 2022, the measure for funding local child care and early learning programs has encountered several issues, including a failed 2024 initiative repeal effort and difficulty recruiting staff.
Although county government has approved more than 20 contracts with local child care providers since June 2024, one contract has been in limbo for nearly a year with the Whatcom County Executive’s Office. The delay is leaving project stakeholders in the dark about why the contract is not yet approved and leading to mounting concern over the potential effect of project delays.
Overall, families are feeling the brunt of the delay — according to a 2018 report by the Opportunity Council, child care capacity has dropped more than 25% in the last decade. The county is 5,000 spots short in available child care programs.
The contract’s approval would allow the creation of a pilot program for an Early Childhood Career Development Network Center at Bellingham Technical College, or BTC. This center, in the works since 2021, would help support and stabilize the county’s child care workforce, offering navigation of provider credentialing requirements and additional professional development.
Those credentialing requirements will be updated in August 2026 per Washington state legislation, when licensed child care and early learning providers must meet their full education staff qualification requirements.
Matthew Santos, BTC dean, said he is encouraged by an April 3 meeting with Whatcom County Health and Community Services, or WCHCS, and other stakeholders. He claims they now have a shared vision for the project and is hopeful they will work toward a timely execution of the contract, now fine-tuning the metrics used to measure progress.
The state’s Department of Children, Youth and Families, or DCYF, is responsible for child care licensing and last updated its requirements in 2019. Since then, DCYF established a non-credit-bearing alternative to college-based licensing known as Provider Access to Community Education, or PACE. Providers must choose between either PACE or a certificate offered by a state community college to achieve their licensing.
Meredith Hayes, a child care specialist for Chuckanut Health Foundation, is also part of Protect Whatcom Kids, a political action committee formed to protect the Healthy Children’s Fund from legal challenges.
[Ed.: Earlier text saying that failure to fully certify child care providers by the 2026 deadline would result in a sharp decrease in the number of providers has been deleted for clarification. A grace period for completing certification will be instated.]
As a whole, Hayes compares a healthy child care system to a four-legged stool. In order for the stool to function as intended, it must include all four legs: quality, affordability, accessibility and adequate staffing.
While creating more child care program infrastructure is well and good, Hayes said that if those programs lack properly-supported, adequately compensated employees, it will not provide the outcomes everyone is hoping for.
“If we just try to increase programs without acknowledging that the workforce is a huge component, we’ll just have a bunch of empty classrooms,” she said.
A timeline
The contract’s progression initially seemed to be moving along just fine.
WCHCS contracted with an advisory committee for the Early Childhood Career Development Network in December 2023, helping create a pilot program proposal.
That proposal was then presented to WCHCS in February 2024 and accepted, with a proposal to BTC leadership the following month. In April 2024, BTC accepted its role as project host. A finalized contract was sent to WCHCS’s legal and finance departments for review in September 2024, and BTC was informed of the contract’s approval the following month.
But in November 2024, BTC was told the contract was under review by the county executive’s office. Last December, college leadership met with executive Satpal Sidhu twice in one week to discuss the contract’s moving forward, but Sidhu did not sign off on the contract.
BTC leaders then requested a meeting with WCHCS and the executive’s office to address questions and concerns about the project, with an initial meeting scheduled for mid-December. WCHCS cancelled the meeting via email and then reached out to suggest a meeting of the three groups on Jan. 17.
“ ‘The council’s upset, we’re upset,’ Gass said.
‘The (Healthy Children’s Fund) opponents are upset.’ ”
After BTC leaders asked for proposed dates and times, neither entity responded to schedule a meeting. After a month of silence, the Early Childhood Career Development Network Center advisory committee submitted a letter to WCHCS and the executive’s office, as well as the Whatcom County Council, Whatcom Child and Family Well-Being Task Force and BTC, requesting updates on why the contract approval and execution was being delayed. It heard back from the latter but not from WCHCS or the executive’s office.
Ken Gass, a retired Whatcom County pediatrician who is a member of the Mount Baker Foundation’s grant-making committee, said the delay on the contract is frustrating and potentially gives ammunition to opponents of the Healthy Children’s Fund.
“The council’s upset, we’re upset,” Gass said. “The (Healthy Children’s Fund) opponents are upset — saying the money isn’t getting out the door (and) it’s just going to be a slush fund.”
The lack of transparency eventually led 11 members of the Early Childhood Career Development Network Center advisory committee to attend the March 11 council meeting.
Jen Knudsen, BTC’s program manager for Child and Family Studies, told Salish Current in an email that nine committee members attended the meeting in-person, including those affiliated with BTC, Whatcom Community College, Western Washington University, the Imagine Institute of Washington and the Center for the Retention and Expansion of Child Care/Opportunity Council.
Six members made public comments at the meeting, all requesting an update from both WCHCS and the executive’s office, she added. This ultimately led to the April 3 meeting where they developed a shared vision moving forward.
Additional processing issues
Healthy Children’s Fund providers who are receiving regular funds have also encountered delays of a different sort.
Michelle Anderson, the owner of Mobile Mama, a perinatal mental health service, said she experienced a delay in receiving allocated funds this January.
“I was told it was related to the Whatcom County Health and Community Services changing financial systems and it is taking a while for the finance department to issue purchase orders,” she wrote in an email.
Marie Junek, communications specialist for WCHCS, told Salish Current in an email the department has addressed several issues associated with invoice processing. In addition to WCHCS and the county’s finance department being understaffed, newer employees are taking time to be integrated. The entire county government also transitioned to a new software system for payments around the turn of the year, resulting in delayed payments, she added.
“We have worked individually with each vendor to resolve payment issues, trained staff to use the new software and hired staff to address these issues,” Junek wrote. “This process has not been easy, and we deeply appreciate the patience of our vendors while we worked through these issues.”
— By Matt Benoit
Also read in Salish Current:
• “Initiative to repeal Whatcom County child care tax goes to court,” July 18, 2024
• “Commentary: Child care crisis requires creative thinking, new ideas,” July 10, 2024
• “Mind the gap: Whatcom providers face challenges in meeting need for child care,” April 21, 2023
• “Child care shortfall frustrates families, hampers local economy,” Sept. 22, 2022