Some Oklahoma lawmakers want to launch a state agency devoted to serving the needs of young children and their mothers. One state representative hosted an interim study on Monday to explore the possibilities.
The agency would be dubbed the "Department of Early Childhood Services."
Rep. Trish Ranson, D-Stillwater, led the interim study, which focused on the challenges Oklahomans face when it comes to early childhood education and support services. The discussion explored policy solutions and other states' existing early childhood.
Ranson said the state needs to consolidate resources that address a growing health and mental health crisis, especially for young children and their mothers.
"The successes of other states in creating an early childhood department is inspiring," Ranson said. "I believe we can build on their successes to create a Department for Early Childhood for Oklahoma children and families that balances family-centered services with data-driven outcomes."
Regina Birchum is the Director of the State Legislative Office of Fiscal Transparency, or LOFT. She presented a review of Oklahoma's childhood services and highlighted the major points.
"First, while there are some educational components of early childhood programs, they are largely focused on health and well-being of children," Birchum said. "Second, there are opportunities to streamline Oklahoma's investments in early childhood programs and improve efficiencies through a unified state strategy."
She said some services provided by the state, like food stamps and Medicaid, overlap with each other and the piecemeal services offered by other providers, all of which keep varying levels of data on the outcomes of their services. That limits the extent to which the state can determine whether investments made in early childhood development are working to improve educational and health outcomes, Birchum said.
"The overlap of services across the various agencies targeting similar demographics … creates a potential for duplication of services as well as uncoordinated services to families," Birchum said. "LOFT found that a family could be participating in multiple services, but often the agencies each use different identifiers for that family, making it difficult to determine the number of unique Oklahomans served or whether a family was enrolled in all the services."
Across Oklahoma, 56 of 77 counties are considered healthcare deserts, according to LOFT.
LOFT recommends that lawmakers establish an agency focused on early childhood development, as 13 other states already have.
