Sen. Rob Rolison, R-Poughkeepsie, speaks during a news conference earlier this month in Albany.

Child care options can be limited for parents who work during the normal business day. But parents who work nontraditional hours have an even harder time finding child care.

Sen. Rob Rolison, R-Poughkeepsie, wants the state Office of Children and Family Services to find a way to help parents working second and third shift by finding a model for child care providers to use if they choose to implement and operate non-traditional child care hours. The Urban Institute defines non-traditional hours as overnight, late evening or early morning child care.

“New York state is facing a major childcare shortage, and the state must take action to address this shortage. By creating a model for non-traditional childcare hours, providers will have more clarity and ability to start nontraditional hours programs,” Rolison wrote in his legislative justification.

Rolison is calling on the state Office of Children and Family Services to establish rules and regulations that includes hours for non-traditional child care, staffing requirements, program payment rates and other requirements the state may deem necessary. Often, parents working outside of the traditional 9 a.m. to 5 p.m. work day use family, friends or neighbors for child care, though some states are doing more to expand options for child care in non-traditional hours.

The National Governors Association Children and Families team hosted a monthly Human Services Policy Advisors Institute Call in October centered on improving non-traditional hours child care. Some states, the Urban Institute said during the call, are boosting the quality of family, friend, and neighbor care by allowing their participation in professional development opportunities (Hawaii) or allowing for a different set of considerations to be taken into account for non-traditional hours or overnight care because the quality of care needed when a child is asleep is different than when a child is awake (Indiana).

States are supporting the business needs of child care providers by allowing counties to create “contract” non-traditional hours slots for child care providers (Colorado) or creating shared service agreements to help providers manage business logistics (Virginia). Other states are supporting family, friend, and neighbor infrastructure by allowing family, friend or neighbor caregivers to access subsidies (Montana, New Jersey) or by providing information, support, or start-up funding to unlicensed caregivers to give them the tools they need to obtain a license (Kentucky, Alaska, Idaho).

All could be options in New York.

“These non-traditional hours programs will benefit parents who work a job with non-traditional hours, be it night shifts or on weekends. With more jobs leaving the traditional nine-to-five framework, these non- traditional hours childcare programs will give great flexibility to working parents and give these working parents more peace of mind that their children are at safe and good childcare facilities,” Rolison wrote in his legislative justification.

Issues that still face the state’s child care industry as a whole may be the biggest issue Rolison faces in trying to improve options for child care during non-traditional hours. “The Status of Child Care Across New York State” was released earlier this year, coordinated by Cornell University’s ILR Buffalo Co-Lab between 2021 and 2024. In the report, Buffalo Co-Lab researchers found the initial influx of state funding helped to\ stabilize the child care industry during the pandemic. Since the pandemic there has been little progress in the availability of and accessibility to child care in New York state. The study showed minor gains in capacity since 2021, but losses in many areas across the state, particularly in upstate counties and low-income communities, where child care deserts and near-deserts already existed.

Among New Yorkers with children who responded to Cornell University’s 2023 Empire State Poll questions regarding their child care needs, more than two out of five respondents indicated that they or an adult member of their household decided to forgo employment outside of their home due to child care. In a follow-up question asking why these respondents turned down paid employment outside the home for reasons related to child care, more than half (53%) indicated that the biggest reason for their decision was the high cost of child care.

Nearly one-quarter (23%) of respondents said that their biggest obstacle to employment was lack of accessible child care in their area.