Cambridge Appoints Members to Childcare Affordability Task Force

The Cambridge City Council appointed 14 members to a new task force charged with tackling the rising cost of childcare — assembling the second group intended to assess affordability measures in the last four months.

The Joint Childcare Access Task Force will spend at least ten months examining ways to expand affordable care, particularly for infants and toddlers. The appointed members include City Councilors, staff, and experts in childcare and workforce development. The task force is set to present a final report to the Council next June.

The city provides universal free preschool to four-year-olds and many three-year-olds through the Cambridge Preschool Program, but infants and toddlers are generally not covered, although councilors signaled interest in expanding the scope in June.

In a report to the City Council, Executive Director of the Cambridge Office of Early Childhood Cheryl Ohlson wrote that families with infants and toddlers not covered by the existing program still face significant childcare costs.

“Access to high‐quality childcare has been proven to improve family wellbeing by expanding employment and educational opportunities, increasing earning potential, and enhancing economic stability,” Ohlson wrote.

Over the next 10 months, the task force will assess Cambridge’s existing childcare system and examine local and national models to develop an implementation plan that considers affordability, provider stability, workforce needs, and facilities. Ohlson wrote that the development process would draw significantly from resident input.

“This will include broad engagement with families, caregivers, early childhood providers, and other stakeholders, as well as insights from recent initiatives that have already undergone significant community engagement,” she wrote.

The task force comes as Cambridge’s first affordability task force is underway. The Social Housing Task Force, established in May, has held three meetings and is developing recommendations for a potential social housing model and pilot project.

Cambridge spends more than $40 million annually on affordable housing and has supported more than 4,500 affordable units in the last two decades. In a joint report to the Council, Mayor Sumbul Siddiqui and Councilors Jivan G. Sobrinho-Wheeler and Ayah A. Al-Zubi ’23 wrote that the goal of the task force is to consider how social housing could complement, rather than duplicate, existing housing programs.

“It is important to ensure that a social housing program fills gaps rather than competing with existing strategies,” they wrote.

The group ultimately aims to recommend a model and identify a potential pilot project, including its unit mix and financing. In meetings so far, members have expressed interest in ideas including mixed-income rental housing, income tiers, and stronger tenant governance.

Siddiqui, Sobhrino-Wheeler, and Al-Zubi wrote in their report that these proposals serve as starting points rather than all-encompassing solutions.

“Social housing alone would not resolve broader economic conditions or eliminate the need for subsidies, but could serve as a meaningful proof of concept for the City,” they wrote.

The Social Housing Task Force will meet in early October to discuss tenant governance, with a financial consultant joining later in October. The Childcare Access Task Force will continue its work through at least June 2027.

—Staff writer Risha Sinha can be reached at [email protected].

—Staff writer Maya Fu can be reached at [email protected].