As first-term legislators from Oxford County, our orientation is pretty conservative. We don’t like spending taxpayers’ money. But what we like even less — and what we saw during our collective 70 years in law enforcement — is the cycle of generational crime. We arrested third and fourth generations of the same families. Ask any law enforcement leaders across the state and he or she will tell you that they have had the same experiences.

That is why we are committed to end that vicious cycle.

One of the best crime-reduction strategies, proven to give kids the right start in life and reduce the probability that they will be involved in crime later on, is a high-quality early education program. We feel very strongly that this is a worthy investment both now and into the future and we are proud to be co-sponsoring bills to help fund Head Start and child care subsidies for low income working parents.

Research clearly shows high-quality early care and education for at-risk kids cannot only reduce the likelihood of a child committing a crime later in life, but it also provides far greater cost savings to our communities and our state in the long run.

There has been a great deal of research on this topic. Chicago’s Child-Parent Centers, which are government-funded early education programs that have served more than 100,000 three- and four-year-olds, found that at-risk kids left out of the program were 70 percent more likely to be arrested for a violent crime by age 18.

Similarly, children in the control group left out of the High Scope/Perry Preschool in Michigan were five times more likely to be chronic offenders with five or more arrests by age 27.

Research also shows that these programs save money — an average of more than $26,000 for every child served. These savings come largely from decreased costs for crime and incarceration, and increased wages when children who attend high-quality early education programs graduate high school and obtain better-paying jobs.

Head Start is a community–based program that promotes the school readiness of 3- and 4-year-old children from families living in poverty. For a family of four, that means their family income was less than $24,418 in 2014.

Head Start children and their families participate in a wide array of programming that supports each child’s cognitive, social and emotional development, including education and nutrition. Head Start also supports parents in their job as their children’s first teachers.

Only 28 percent, or about 4,400, of Maine children eligible for Head Start participate, due to lack of funding.

We are also pleased to support additional funding in the Child Care Development Fund.

The Maine Child Care Development Fund is a federal-state partnership that provides supports to help low-income working parents pay for child care, with a sliding scale of subsidy based on income. Here in Maine only a small percentage of eligible families — currently fewer than 3,000 children — receive child care vouchers.

We know that 69 percent of Maine children ages 6 and under have all parents in the Maine workforce. The need for increased quality child care for these children is obvious. The bottom line is lower-income working parents need help affording child care so they can work — and we all want as many able-bodied adults working as possible to help support their families and Maine’s economy.

As in other early learning programs like Head Start, it is important that child care be of high quality. High-quality child care experiences can increase school readiness for the children and give parents the peace of mind they need to focus on their work during their workdays.

The legislative proposals we are supporting ask for very modest amounts to offer programs for just some of the unmet need in Maine — $2 million each for each year of the biennium. Out of a biennial budget that is more than $6 billion. That’s a fraction of one percent.

It’s also a mere fraction of the $380 million Maine taxpayers spend annually on less than 5,000 inmates and prisoners in our state prisons and county jails.

As new state representatives and seasoned former law enforcement leaders, we are pleased, and honored, to speak out for our youngest citizens — ones who never testify in State House committee rooms.

We hope our colleagues on both sides of the political aisle will think about the challenges facing Maine children under the age of six years old who live in poverty or very low-income families, and join us in being their voice for the need of increased high-quality early learning programs.

Rep. Lloyd “Skip” Herrick, R-Paris, represents House District 73. From 1991-2006 he served as Oxford County sheriff. Rep. Richard Pickett, R-Dixfield, represents House District 116. From March 1976  to April 1998 he served as a state trooper and from May 1998 to January 2005 he served as chief of police in Dixfield.

Copy the Story Link