On March 31, 2025, the Trump administration abruptly closed five regional Head Start offices that provided support and guidance for Head Start programs in TK23 states and territories, including Puerto Rico and the U.S. Virgin Islands. The sudden loss of the regional staff who have been key partners in ensuring the success of the Head Start and Early Head Start programs is a serious blow and will critically disrupt Head Start’s viability for millions of children and families. One of those unexpectedly shuttered regional offices was Region 9 in San Francisco, which oversaw all Head Start programs in California, Hawai‘i, Nevada, and Arizona, including CommUnify’s 20 Head Start campuses across Santa Barbara County.
This hasty shutdown threatens the future of our local Head Start program and the children and families it serves — no warning, no transition plan. And it jeopardizes critical support for some of the most vulnerable members of our community.
But the worst is yet to come. Project 2025 proposes to completely eliminate the Head Start and Early Head Start programs, which serve more than one million children annually. Without Head Start, families who are already struggling financially could experience even greater economic burdens as they would have to spend funds they don’t have on childcare, or forego working in order to stay home with their children. This would in turn impact local workforces across our nation and in our county, and could create other negative outcomes such as increased homelessness, food insecurity, mental health challenges, and unsafe/unlicensed childcare settings.