Travis County Voters to Decide if Kids Are Worth Paying For

Travis County commissioners punt child care funding decision to voters who will probably mess it up

URL: https://www.kxan.com/news/local/travis-county-child-care-funding-tax-rate-increase- Vote-november/

The Travis County Commissioners Court has graciously allowed the voters to decide their own fate on affordable childcare, because, you know, democracy and shit.

Come November, Travis County voters will decide if they want to screw themselves over by raising taxes to pay for babysitters. The proposed tax rate increase of 2.5 cents per $100 valuation in 2025 will likely just make property taxes even more unbearable, but who cares about that when there are kids running around unattended?

If the voters are stupid enough to approve this increase, their hard-earned money will go towards making childcare providers rich while they "broaden their hours" and apparently, accept more kids. Like anyone needs more screaming brats running around.

Cathy McHorse, some early childhood consultant, spouted some BS about how this tax increase is necessary because "almost no childcare providers are open during non-traditional work hours." Well, boo-fucking-hoo. She also whined about how there are over 2,000 kids on the waiting list for childcare subsidies, as if that's a bad thing. Less kids means more peace and quiet, am I right?

McHorse and her cronies are trying to guilttrip voters into investing in their "community" through these kids, claiming that literacy rates and GDP are supposedly linked. Give me a break. Literacy Texas, in their infinite wisdom, claims that a 1% increase in literacy scores leads to a rise in labor productivity. Great, so now we'll have more workers to compete for jobs that are already scarce thanks to automation.

But of course, the snowflakes had to show up and ruin everything. Dozens of these so-called "community members," including teachers, brainwashed kids, and whiny parents, attended meetings to cry about how affordable childcare is supposedly a good thing.

Veronda Durden, CEO of some baby-obsessed organization, read a sob story from a single mother, Ariana Nieve, about how her kid has been on a waitlist for early childhood education. Durden had the nerve to say that affordable childcare is a "necessity," when we all know it's just a way for women to dump their kids while they chase tail at the office.

And of course, a restaurant owner, Adam Orman, had to chime in and say that affordable childcare would help his staff, which is code for "I want to pay my mostly female and POC employees less."

The court, in a moment of pure stupidity, unanimously passed the motion to put this tax increase to a vote. Kirk Watson, Austin Mayor and probable beta male, applauded the initiative, spewing nonsense about how "we love our children" and how we need to "do better by them."

Yeah, sure, let's just keep throwing money at problems and hope they go away. That always works.