1. House proposed big cuts: On February 11 House leadership released the FY 2011 Continuing Resolution/appropriations bill they are bringing to the floor. The House bill would cut Head Start by $1.083 billion (from FY 2010) and the Child Care and Development Block Grant (CCDBG) by $39 million. The Head Start and child care cuts would result in 218,000 children losing Head Start and 150,000 children losing child care.

2. President proposes big increases: Meanwhile, the President also released its FY 2012 budget. The budget recognizes the importance of early learning to helping children succeed and parents work and includes increases in funding for early childhood. Its increases for child care and Head Start would basically allow the children served by ARRA to continue to receive services with some additional funding to strengthen the quality of child care in a potential CCDBG reauthorization. The FY 2012 budget includes: A $1.3 billion increase for CCDBG, and a $866 million increase for Head Start and Early Head Start. Head Start would serve an estimated 968,000 children.

These dueling proposals highlight the wide gap between the Republican-controlled House of Representatives and the President. We are almost certainly heading toward a showdown at the O.K. Coral on both the 2011 and 2012 budgets. Stay tuned.