Local Child Care Centers’ Waiting Lists Continue To Grow As Staffing, Space, Funding Hamper Expansions

Despite ongoing efforts by providers in the area, Carroll County’s status as a child care desert persists, according to the board president of one local center. Brad Vollstedt, who volunteers on the board of the Manning Child Care Center, presented the facility’s Fiscal Year (FY) 2027 funding request to the Carroll County Board of Supervisors at Monday’s meeting. He says it’s a common theme for providers throughout western Iowa: demand for child care far outpaces supply.

It’s a similar story for the county’s other centers. The Kids Day Care Center in Breda has around two dozen families on its waiting list, the Carroll Area Child Care Center and Preschool has upwards of 75 kids waiting for a slot to open, and the Lil’ Wildcats Center in Glidden has around 15 families on its waiting list. This is an issue for private providers too, as in-home daycares are restricted to as few as six kids, depending on qualifications. Vollstedt says most of the region’s licensed centers, including Manning, would take on more kids, but funding, staffing, and space make adding slots difficult.

One route child care center boards could take is to raise their rates, but at some point, it doesn’t make economic sense for a family to pay a significant portion of one parent’s salary when they could stay home and care for their children themselves. Board Chair Gene Meiners says the county’s economic output is directly impacted by child care availability.

Staff from the Carroll County Growth Partnership (CCGP) and local economic development organizations frequently cite hiring staff as a critical challenge for the county’s employers. The county often supports its licensed centers annually with Local Option Sales Tax (LOST) funds, and for FY27, the supervisors allocated $5,000 to the Carroll center and $6,000 to the centers in Manning and Breda.