On Monday, November the 2nd, a DES official, authorized to do so, told ACCA and other groups that November 16th was the definitive date for a partial release of the waiting list and that letters were going to to parents probably by mid week. ACCA and other groups notified their members and Sycamore published this information in our blog posting "DES is Back" on November 2. Calls by child care centers to DES however indicated that the DES staff did not know about these changes. ACCA checked and the parent letters were not sent out. Last Thursday, DES changed its message and said that the partial release of the DES waiting list and re-opening of Fee levels 1 and 2 was now "proposed" with no date certain. The decision about whether to do a partial release of the waiting list has not been made and obviously it did not happen as promised on Monday the 16th.
From Bruce Liggett of ACCA:
"So many of you sent notes expressing thanks for some financial relief and being hopeful about what the partial release might have meant for your center(s), parents, children and businesses. I know many of you contacted parents to prepare them for the waiting list release. I regret the confusion and disappointment ..... At this point, from my perspective, no decision is a decision - the denial list further reduces the DES subsidy , beyond the targeted cut amount of $30 million..."
We will keep you posted as soon as there is any new information.