St. Josef daycare center in need: City council discusses urgently needed grants!

St. Josef daycare center in need: City council discusses urgently needed grants!

The Catholic daycare center St. Josef is faced with the necessary renovations to meet the requirements of the new daycare law. In particular, the kitchen equipment is supplemented as well as the renewal of the floor covering in the dining room. The estimated costs for these measures amount to almost 19,500 euros. In order to ensure this financing, the Catholic parish of Bellheim has requested support from the Zeiskam community. However, the Bellheim community administration emphasizes that such grants are considered as voluntary expenses and that there is no legal payment obligation. In the 5th investment program, one billion euros is currently being provided to create 90,000 new childcare places. The financing is partially secured by the Next Generation EU program and is to be called up by the end of June 2024.

The quality of early childhood education is the focus of numerous reforms. Since the introduction of the legal entitlement to funding in daycare facilities in 2013, significant progress has been made, both in the expansion and in quality. The federal government supports the federal states in the context of the KITA quality law with around four billion euros by 2026. Around two billion euros per year flow into improving the offers for children, whereby the specific measures in contracts between the federal government and the federal states are determined , which can be seen from the information of the BMFSFJ .

From 2025, the countries are obliged to take at least one measure in the areas of extraction and securing qualified specialists as well as linguistic education. This is particularly crucial against the background that the childcare rate of the under three year olds from 17.6 percent in 2008 rose to 36.4 percent in 2023. The need for high -quality care is therefore becoming more and more urgent to ensure equal opportunities and to facilitate the compatibility of family and work.