Back to Case Studies “Child care is an unrelenting need; the cost is very high. I never claim victory and never give up on finding things to do to support our staff.”
Teresa Roche, City of Fort Collins Human Resources Executive
Background: Surveys Show Flexibility Prized Above Onsite Child Care
Around 2019, Teresa Roche, human resources executive for the City of Fort Collins, Colorado, was well aware of widespread child care shortages and was looking to bolster the city’s backup care program for employees. But then COVID-19 emerged, schools closed and child care quickly became one of the highest priorities for onsite employees. When Fort Collins City Council asked Roche what more the city could be doing to support employees’ child care needs during the pandemic, she saw the chance to act, and quickly.
The city had an opportunity to explore in-person child care for city employees using existing recreation centers. Through a “quick and dirty” survey, according to Roche, the city asked employees their thoughts on giving them access to a near-site or on-site child care center. The results were surprising.
“It was fascinating,” Roche said. “There was almost zero interest in the child care facility. Of course, that was because people were not willing to bring their children outside of their home during the height of COVID.” So, the city dug further, issuing another survey on telecommuting and how it applied to caregiving.
The telecommuting and child care studies clearly showed that employees were most interested in in-home, high quality care – and that they prized flexibility above all else. So, Roche and her team set out to add onto their existing child care benefits for the city’s workforce.
Solutions: Customizing Add-On Child Care Benefits to Support Employee Needs
Using employee feedback as its North Star, the City of Fort Collins implemented the following tactics and add-ons to their child care benefits.
From Women’s Group to Employee Resource Group for Caregivers
One of Roche’s first moves was to engage an existing volunteer women’s group that had a small subcommittee of single parents. She spoke with the members about the opportunity to become an official employee resource group, or ERG, which would give them a budget for activities and access to official communication channels. Ultimately, that group became the Caregivers’ Alliance, an official ERG encompassing all types of caregivers.
The Caregivers’ Alliance came to function as a sounding board for city leaders, with members providing insight into issues facing working parents. Members are highly engaged and helpful in supporting changes, including new policies. In fact, as results from the caregiving and telecommuting surveys came in, the group organized a “roadshow,” bringing presentations and discussions to employees throughout the organization. “It was powerful for managers to hear more about the needs from caregivers directly,” Roche says.
Subsidized Emergency Backup Care
One of the biggest opportunities was boosting emergency backup care for employees, particularly for frontline workers, which the city did throughout the pandemic. Taking these learnings, in March 2024 human resources introduced an expanded backup caregiving program with MyWoosah. The city subsidizes the program for employees, providing 100 hours of caregiving per employee, per calendar year. Through the program, employees pay a $7-per-hour copay for a minimum of four hours and have 24/7 access to child care, adult care and even transportation assistance, specifically:
– MyWoosah Drive: Transportation support for getting family members to and from school dropoff, after-school activities, medical appointments or social events.
– MyWoosah Care: Traditional in-home child care for children under 16, which includes overall care, engagement, safety, meal prep, light housekeeping, laundry and homework supervision.
– MyWoosah Adult Care: In-home, non-medical, companion care for adult dependents requiring social interaction and daily assistance with meal preparation, household chores, errands, medication reminders and appointments.
Scholarships for Summer Camps
One of the most popular expansions of add-on child care benefits came from the Fort Collins Recreation Department. Since the city already puts on recreational programming like summer camps and activities for the community, and even subsidizes costs for lower-income families, they simply expanded the program to include city employees. The Recreation Department holds some spots for city employees and reimburses employees for a portion of the cost.
Designing Flexible Work Environments and Policies to Support Caregivers
Using feedback from ongoing surveys, the City of Fort Collins put in place flexible work options like telecommuting and hybrid work to support employees during the pandemic, a philosophy they now call “The Future of Work.” Not surprisingly, flexible work arrangements aided employees, particularly those with caregiving needs. Even several years later, the city continues to support work-from-home and hybrid options for some positions, which in turn support caregivers.
Finally, recent changes to Colorado law required the city to review several of its policies, which presented the opportunity to further support caregivers. For example, the city opted to extend parental leave for employees of any gender and revised sick leave policies to allow parents to use the hours when their children are sick, effectively broadening their staff’s ability to leave for caregiving.
Results: Increased Flexibility for Caregiving Drives Employee Satisfaction
Early KPIs
The City of Fort Collins has seen some early successes after implementing add-on child care benefits. In the first seven months that MyWoosah backup benefits were available, 75 employees enrolled and used the new services. Additionally, 50 employees applied to take part in the city’s recreational child care subsidies, with 86% of applicants requesting reimbursement in 2024. “It may seem small, but there’s no one that needs these benefits that isn’t using them,” Roche said.
The city’s flexible work policies of the pandemic era continue to be quite popular, and about 40% of positions allow remote or hybrid work. In one survey, 98% of respondents answered that they feel supported by workplace flexibility.
Additionally, the Caregivers’ Alliance ERG continues to provide feedback and aid implementation of child care benefits for the city, ensuring employees feel heard and understand how leaders base decisions on feedback.
A Win for Retention
The number of employees that have resigned citing inflexibility or issues with child care is low, according to Roche. The improvement to benefits has allowed the city to retain its longer-tenured employees and continue leveraging their institutional knowledge. Of course, strong retention also aids the city’s finances by limiting the need to train new employees due to turnover.
Challenges: Balancing Multiple Needs
As local government, the City of Fort Collins does not have the leeway that private entities do; their budget is funded by taxpayers, and there’s a constant need to weigh the city workers’ needs against the overarching needs of the municipality. Roche said, “I am constantly straddling what I might want to do for the people in our organization and what the community wants us to do for them.
“There are so many things we want to do for our people, and we can’t do all of them — especially with budget constraints. But that doesn’t stop us from exploring solutions that can help our staff.”
Roche’s Advice to Fellow Leaders
Keep Asking Questions
“Receiving staff feedback continues to be an important way to measure the success of family friendly work policies for the City of Fort Collins. We perform periodic follow-up surveys and also review results from our partners’ surveys to learn how we can improve.”
Remember That the Little Things Add Up
Roche says, “In many ways the pandemic was a great leveler: We had a sensitivity to recognizing the demands of children and others. Through our improvements to caregiving benefits and policies, we named and normalized caregiving and family life. While we can always do more, remember that even smaller actions, like broadening the sick leave policy to include caring for a child who’s sick, signal to people that we see they have a whole life.”
For Those in the Public Sector
“We live in a ‘both/and’ reality. There are going to be constraints financially. There are going to be things that your community wants and you have to be sensitive to that, but really you can push the boundaries. There are a lot of things you can do for parents and caregivers, and they don’t have to cost a lot of money. I like to think: What can I do?”
