A new bill passed by the Oregon state Senate requires landlords to allow childcare services to run out of their rental units.
Story at a glance
- The Oregon state Senate passed on bill this week requiring landlords to allow childcare services out of their rental units.
- The bill is aimed at addressing the state’s childcare shortage which is especially pronounced in rural communities and communities of color.
- The bill provides protections for both landlords and tenants who wish to use their units as family childcare spaces.
Once signed by the governor, the legislation will help the state’s childcare shortage by expanding the space available to chi providers, bill co-sponsors Senator Dick Anderson (R) and Senator Elizabeth Steiner (D) said in a joint statement.
More than half of Americans live in a childcare desert, or areas where there are too few licensed childcare facilities for the number of children who need care, according to the Center for American Progress.
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And in Oregon, that number is even higher with sixty percent of people living in a childcare desert.
“This bill is an important step to provide more affordable childcare options so that working families can stay in their communities,” said Senator Anderson in a statement. “This security will have a compounding effect on increased workforce performance, longer tenure of employees, and more stable homelives.”
Under the bill, tenants must be state registered childcare providers and notify their landlord that they intend to use a unit as a family childcare space.
Tenants must also notify their landlord in advance if they intend to remodel their rental unit in order to offer child care services.
Landlords are also barred from retaliating against tenants by raising the rent or decreasing any services because of their childcare work, according to the bill.
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