Young Children Can’t Wait for Disaster Lessons to be Learned

Early Ed Watch is pleased to feature this guest post by Catherine Graham Hildum. Hildum covered early childhood issues for the Senate Subcommittee on Children and Families during the aftermath of Hurricanes Katrina and Rita, and currently works with Linchpin Strategies, a policy consulting firm in Washington, D.C.

In 2005, Hurricanes Katrina and Rita brought to light the lack of a federally coordinated mechanism for assisting young children in the wake of a disaster. FEMA estimated that more than 270,000 evacuees on the Gulf coast of the United States spent time in evacuation centers after the hurricanes. This figure does not specify the number of young children or account for all of the children displaced from their childcare and early education settings. All of the affected children had both short-term health and safety needs and longer-term safety, stability and mental health needs. During fall 2005 and after, disaster relief efforts focused on getting people back in safe housing, back to work and children back to school. What was missing from these efforts was attention to the critical role that appropriate care for young children plays in allowing adults to relocate, rebuild and work.

Unfortunately, too little has changed in the three years since Katrina. The federal Stafford Act, which authorizes federal disaster assistance, has been amended to ensure proper planning and care of pets, but there is still not a system in place for ensuring accurate information and coordinated services to assist children.

Recent disasters impacting young children

Newsweek reports that “our littlest evacuees” are still being overlooked. In September, Hurricane Ike swept through the Texas coast leaving tens of thousands of young children in its wake. The Houston Chronicle reported that Ike left 45,000 young children without childcare. Similarly, flooding devastated the Midwest this summer, affecting many families with young children. In Cedar Rapids, Iowa, 16 percent of licensed childcare providers suffered damages. Some progress has been made in ensuring children’s immediate safety in temporary shelters and rebuilding their security and the centers and preschools they attended. But much more remains to be done.

The Mississippi State University Early Childhood Institute (ECI) has found that many states are unprepared to respond to the needs of young children in major disasters. In a report this August, they found that only 15 states require licensed childcare providers to have disaster preparedness plan in place. ECI’s research on capacity grew out of their leadership of the large public –private effort entitled “Rebuilding After Katrina” which has led to restoring child care capacity in Mississippi’s Gulf . Much work has been done at state, local and federal levels, but clearly greater efforts and coordination are required to keep children safe.

Lessons Learned from Hurricane Katrina

In the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina, policymakers had a difficult time estimating the number of very young children impacted by the storm. Because preschool-aged children spend time in a variety of early care and education settings—childcare centers, family care homes, part-day Head Start or preschool programs, and public pre-kindergarten, among others—local, state, and federal officials find tracking young children challenging even before a disaster strikes. Accounting for them following a disaster like Katrina can benearly impossible.

Following Hurricanes Katrina and Rita, Community Action Agencies, Head Start Centers and other federally funded programs provided for thousands of refugees. Along with these programs, non-profit organizations, private donations and corporate assistance, and a multitude of volunteers in the region provided immediate recovery assistance. Federal Head Start programs received an infusion of funding to take in evacuee children, as well as increased flexibility in their eligibility guidelines to enable them to do so. Since childcare centers are not public institutions like schools, they are not eligible for immediate federal disaster assistance. Private institutions providing essential services such as power and water receive federal disaster assistance, but child care is not considered an essential service. The Gulf States were instead provided flexible federal funding and relaxed regulations to aid children served in childcare settings.

Katrina also highlighted the unique needs of infants and toddlers in the aftermath of a disaster. Cribs, diapers, adequate shelter and safe spaces for infants and toddlers were often lacking . Lessons about these unique needs proved instructive for helping children in recent disasters, but a broader coordinated effort is still lacking.

To address the clear need for more coordinated information and planning for children affected by disasters, Congress established the National Commission on Children and Disasters, which brings together experts in the fields of child development, safety, health and mental health and disaster preparedness to make policy recommendations for the federal government. The Commission met for the first time on October 14 and will have 16 months to complete its work. Unfortunately, the recommendations won’t be ready before the next hurricane season hits. In the meantime, federal, state, and local policymakers should begin implementing the following recommendations:

1. Improve data collection on young children and the programs and services where they spend the time. In order to effectively reach all children; local, state and federal officials must do a better job of collecting and coordinating data.
2. Build on existing programs such as Head Start to provide high-quality comprehensive services for children and their families in the aftermath of disasters. Integrate and coordinate programs in which children may be involved and include mental health services. Many states are already moving toward coordinated early childhood systems and these efforts should instruct disaster planning.
3. Coordinate efforts between local, state and federal entities, allowing local entities that know their communities and residents well to play a lead role in planning and recovery efforts.
4. Consider childcare an essential service for purposes of federal disaster relief. This will allow more immediate funding to flow to centers and allow parents to know their children are safe while they begin to rebuild, relocate, look for work or go back to work.

Researchers, advocates and policy makers will continue to write recommendations for assisting young children in disasters. I look forward to the Commission’s recommendations and to a coordinated federal plan to keep young children out of harm’s way.

–Catherine Graham Hildum