Erica Breunlin | The Colorado Sun
Ten empty cribs fill a canary yellow classroom at Mero Kaya’s Jump Start Early Learning Academy of Englewood. Toys are stowed neatly in brightly colored buckets. A mobile of bees and honeycombs hangs still.
Kaya and his wife, Ranada, have cozied up the space so that infants can be coddled, cradled and comforted while separated from their parents during the workday.
But where they once imagined the sound of cries and lullabies drifting out the door, the room is quiet. The Kayas can’t fill the room with infants, no matter how desperately those babies need a place to go.
Parents simply can’t afford to bring their babies because of the high cost of child care. The Kayas can’t afford to run an infant room with the staff-to-baby ratio that is required. And the government subsidies that were barely holding the child care industry together are now uncertain.