About 60 percent of Toronto’s nonprofit child care centers have opted for $10/day, with rebates not due to start until the fall.

About 60 percent of Toronto’s nonprofit child care centers opted into the federal government’s $10-a-day program before the Sept. 1 deadline, but uptake among for-profit centers has slowed. lagged behind.

The most recent data reveals that 535 of the approximately 1,000 licensed operators in Toronto applied to participate in the program as of last week, while 28 indicated their intention to opt out.

However, so far participation in the program appears to vary considerably depending on the center’s operating model.

The city says about 444 of Toronto’s 726 nonprofits have submitted opt-in papers so far, and hundreds more are expected to clarify their intentions before the deadline.

But as of last week, only 91 for-profit operators had opted in, representing less than 30 percent of those centers.

In an interview with CP24.com, the president of the Ontario Coalition for Better Child Care, Carolyn Ferns, said she is optimistic there will be “almost 100% uptake” among nonprofits before the deadline for receive funding by 2022.

That funding would then be used to reduce parent fees by 25 percent on average retroactive to April 1.

But he admitted there is more uncertainty surrounding for-profit centers, which make up about 25 percent of spaces in Toronto.

Many of those centers have raised concerns about the long-term impacts of signing the agreement and whether they will ultimately be able to lower fees to $10 a day with the level of funding provided.

“I listened to their arguments, but at the end of the day this is real money for parents and there is no risk to them this year (when rates only had to be reduced by 25 percent),” Ferns said. “They say ‘Oh well, what if we opt in this year and we have to opt out and tell parents their rates are going to go up again?’ Well, yes, I suppose it would be difficult, but I think it would be more difficult to tell the parents that they are going to keep the $5,000 that they are owed. I just think that’s really unethical.”

When Ford’s government reached a $13.2 billion settlement with the federal government in March, becoming the latest province to do so, it indicated that parents could start receiving refunds back to April as early as the spring.

But that hasn’t materialized in Toronto, where officials say operators won’t even be informed of the status of their application until after the Sept. 1 deadline. Refunds retroactive to April 1 would likely start in October, a spokesman said.

Fern’s organization represents nearly 200 nonprofit centers.

She told CP24.com that while there have been many concerns about the impacts of changing how child care is originally funded, most centers she has spoken with recently have already applied for the $10 a day program or they are in the process of doing it

He admitted that “clear policy communication” around the program has perhaps been “absent” at times, contributing to anxiety among some operators.

But he said it’s a bit by design, with the guidelines for participating in the show in 2023 yet to be finalized.

“It is understood that there will be some flexibility this year and that is why they made this two-stage process,” he said. “They’re saying ‘Let’s work out the problems and problems this year and then consult with the industry to establish, you know, a system that works for next year.’ I think that’s what they’re trying to do, right? And that’s all they could do, because if they had walked out the door, you know, in April, with very strict and very detailed funding guidelines and then it turned out that they didn’t work, you know, that would have been a lot worse.

Under the terms of the agreement with the federal government, centers participating in the program will be required to reduce fees by an average of 25 percent immediately and then another 25 percent in 2023.

The ultimate goal of the agreement is to see child care rates further reduced to an average of $10 per day by 2026.

Ferns said that while hundreds of centers still remain on the sidelines in cities like Toronto, it’s likely more a product of apps only opening in the summer, when most nonprofit meetings aren’t usually scheduled for meet up.

As for for-profit companies, Ferns said he hopes most will ultimately opt for 2022 “as an act of good faith.”

“Some of those for-profit companies might wait until they know they have what they want for next year, that might be what is happening. But I think they should (opt in in 2022) as an act of good faith and really to put parents first over profit. There’s really no risk for them to do that,” she said.

Elsewhere in the GTA, the Peel Region has said that 173 of its 194 licensed child care operators have completed an expression of interest in the program so far.

Only 13 had formally completed the paperwork to participate, but a spokesperson told CP24.com last week that the region expects the number of applications to rise sharply as the September 1 deadline approaches.

Meanwhile, in York Region, 197 of the 557 licensed centers had formally submitted their applications to opt-in by last week. Five centers had opted out, all of which are for-profit.

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