New child care center opens in Denver among closures, funding freezes

DENVER — Eight months into the Child Care Assistance Program (CCAP) freeze, Warren Village staff are questioning the sustainability of their new center.

Warren Village, a Denver nonprofit providing transitional housing and child care to single parents and their children, in 2021 purchased land on Alameda Avenue in southwest Denver with plans to build an 89-unit apartment equipped to provide child care for up to 110 kids.

They broke ground in 2023 and opened in October 2024, two months before the state announced the CCAP freeze.

“I like to joke that you couldn't have picked a worse time to open an early learning center,” said Ethan Hemming, CEO of Warren Village. “But it’s also an important time because the need is there.”

The CCAP freeze, initiated January 1, stems from federal regulation requiring states to shoulder a higher cost burden for lower-income families paying for child care. An increase in child care rates means Colorado doesn’t have the money to fund CCAP anymore.

Children currently enrolled are not affected, and neither is funding for new child care centers.

A freeze in federal funding for child care has forced several Colorado early learning centers to scale back and cut programs. 

“If I didn’t have CCAP, I would be completely out of luck,” said Jesse Ramsey, a single father with two kids who attend day care at Warren Village Alameda. 

Warren Village operates two low-income apartment buildings with adjoining child care centers. The other is on Gilpin Street, next to Cheesman Park. 

Ramsey worked as a welder before he was diagnosed with Superior Mesenteric Artery System, a rare disorder where the small intestine is compressed between the abdominal aorta and the superior mesenteric artery. He was making $28.50 per hour and working 50-hour weeks as a welder, which he said was hardly enough money to support his family. 

Ramsey’s job also required him to clock in at 4:30 a.m., and every child care center he could find opened after that. The centers he found also charged around $2,000 per month for his two children, which he struggled to afford. But he made too much money to qualify for support at that time.

Data published by the United States Department of Labor shows child care in Denver costs about $25,000 a year per child.

“Day cares and stuff are not set up for people that work in the trades, because when you work in the trades, you have to be at work really early and your income is in a weird in between spot where you don’t make enough to afford anything, but you make too much to get a subsidy,” Ramsey said.

Ramsey thought a higher-paying job was the only solution, so he enrolled in a mechanical engineering program at the Community College of Denver in addition to working his welding job. 

His illness progressed rapidly in April 2023. He was nauseous every day and could not keep food down. Because SMA syndrome is rare, Ramsey said doctors could not diagnose him until September the same year. Shortly after receiving the diagnosis, Ramsey dropped out of school and quit his job. 

Unable to afford rent, he and his children, then 3 and 5, took shelter at Lambuth Family Center, a homeless shelter for families in Denver operated by The Salvation Army. Staff at the shelter told Ramsey about Warren Village, and he and his two children moved into the Gilpin Street location in December 2023, then the Alameda Avenue location in March 2025.

“Moving into Warren Village was life-changing for me,” Ramsey said.

Ramsey said Warren Village staff hosted parties for residents at nearby Cheesman Park. It was accessible for Ramsey and enjoyable for his kids.

“I had a feeding tube in me at all times, so it was nice to be able to just walk to the park, sit down and see the kids having fun,” Ramsey said.

Ramsey enrolled in CCAP in 2023 while attending classes, right after quitting his job, when his income was low enough to qualify.

Because the freeze only affects families who’ve tried to enroll this year, Ramsey’s child care costs are still covered. He has medical appointments almost every day, which he said would be impossible to attend if not for the child care at Warren Village.

Warren Village prioritizes single-parent, low-income households. Parents living in their apartment buildings get help with job training or school applications, while kids receive subsidized child care. Most parents in Warren Village receive CCAP funding, but those affected by the freeze pay $25 to $97 per month. 

“For now, our commitment is to turn nobody away,” Hemming said. “But if the freeze is still on in three years, we may have to.”

The freeze is currently indefinite. Rep. Lorena Garcia, a Democratic state representative and executive director at the Colorado Statewide Parent Coalition, told Rocky Mountain PBS she expects the freeze to last three to five years.

“We just don’t have enough in reserves to cover that, and we're trying to buy some time for some sort of governmental solution to fix this,” Hemming added.

People who applied for CCAP but have been frozen out said paying for child care has been difficult. Mariah Tafoya said Warren Village’s subsidized costs make it doable.

Tafoya prayed for help after a year of homelessness in which she switched between her car and shelters while she was pregnant with her now almost 1-year-old daughter. Weeks after giving birth in September 2024, one of Tafoya’s cousins told her about the new Warren Village site and suggested she apply.

“I felt so grateful and relieved once I got in,” Tafoya said. “Things were just so unstable before that.”

She applied for CCAP in January to cover her 1-year-old in infant care at Warren Village and never heard back about her application. Warren Village is covering the bulk of child care costs through its reserves and savings due to the freeze.

“I can tell my daughter is really happy at the day care,” Tafoya said.

Tafoya’s boyfriend earned minimum wage working at Goodwill and she collects about $100 a month from donating plasma, so the two had been able to scrape together enough to cover the initial payments of $97 a month for child care at Warren Village. In June, her boyfriend was arrested and sentenced to six months in jail. She said his child care payments won’t be as reliable as they used to be. 

Tafoya just accepted a job with a barricade and traffic company, and begins August 12. She hopes the job will get her on track to earning a GED.

“Warren Village is a good step for right now,” Tafoya said. “My daughter seems happy and she’s learning, so that’s all I could ask for.”