Thousands of New York City parents on a waitlist for childcare assistance can soon apply for vouchers, the first time slots have opened up in more than a year, Mayor Mamdani said Monday.
More than 10,000 children ages 6 weeks to 13 years (or older for those with disabilities) will be moved off the Child Care Assistance Program waitlist for low-income families, thanks to funding from Gov. Hochul.
Mamdani was set to make the announcement at a press conference Monday morning in the Bronx.
“Today’s voucher expansion is a critical step in ensuring no family is left behind in our movement towards universal childcare,” Mamdani said in a statement.
But it seems unlikely the supply of vouchers will meet the demand. There were roughly 25,000 children on the waitlist as of June, according to the local education news source Chalkbeat.
Unlike the city’s universal pre-K programs, which contract with the city to provide free care, the Child Care Assistance Program offers families vouchers to help with the cost of care at a program of their choosing.
Former Mayor Eric Adams first closed the program to new low-income families, creating the waitlist, in May 2025 as enrollment spiked and funding failed to keep pace.
Local officials predicted a surge in parents on cash assistance signing up for childcare vouchers as federal work requirements were reinstated after the COVID-19 pandemic. Families on cash assistance are entitled to the vouchers, while those who are low income and found eligible for the program may only receive a voucher if there are funds available.
Hochul last year ultimately allocated enough funding so that low-income families who already had a voucher could hold onto it. But new parents who were eligible for assistance were locked out of the program and put on the waitlist.
Several months later, after Mamdani took office, the governor and mayor announced a sweeping childcare deal that included $475 million for the vouchers. But the Mamdani administration still did not move low-income families off the waitlist in case the surge of families on cash assistance materialized.
Monday’s announcement suggests the mayor and his team have determined that there is enough funding in their coffers for the waitlist to move again.
“In partnership with Mayor Mamdani, we’re building a child care system that lifts up every family, from launching 2-K and expanding 3-K to moving families off waitlists and into high-quality care,” Hochul said in a statement.
As part of the announcement, Mamdani also said his administration added a filter for programs that accept vouchers to a digital childcare map and website launched earlier this year.
Applications will open to families with children already on the waitlist over the next few weeks and continue on a rolling basis over the following few months, according to the news release.
