A majority of local employers recently surveyed report significant challenges for employees in finding available and affordable childcare – a problem that impacts their business.

The survey was conducted in March by a new Childcare Business Task Force launched late last year by the Early Learning Coalition of Sarasota County.

Working with area chambers and economic development corporations, the ELC task force surveyed 157 employers across multiple sectors, from nonprofit and healthcare to construction, hospitality, manufacturing, government, education, and finance.

Nearly 90% of the employers surveyed have workers with young children. Of those, 82% reported that their employees are struggling with childcare costs, while two-thirds said their employees are having trouble finding available childcare.

The childcare crisis hitting employees ultimately affects employers, too. The biggest impacts they listed were increased employee absenteeism and turnover; decreased productivity; the inability to recruit new employees; and a hit to revenues and profits.

“When employees don’t have appropriate childcare, they are not productive,” said Janet Kahn, CEO of the Early Learning Coalition.

While the survey's results are not surprising, Kahn noted, they add concrete data to anecdotal stories that childcare advocates have been hearing for years.

The local feedback also echoes Florida Chamber Foundation studies, which estimate that childcare shortages cost employers statewide $4.47 billion each year due to employee turnover and absences.

However, Kahn said one of the biggest take-aways from the study is employers’ eagerness to be part of solutions.

“That was very positive and hopeful,” Kahn said. “We need everybody at the table working together.”

Nearly 60 surveyed employers expressed a desire to join the task force. And 16 said they’d consider providing on-site childcare.

A number of local employers have started doing just that by partnering with childcare providers such as the YMCA of Southwest Florida to operate centers at the employers' facilities.

Following the survey, the task force hopes to serve as a "matchmaker" for additional creative relationships between employers wanting to help and childcare providers ready to expand but in need of support, said task force head Brittany Lamont.

Employer respondents to the survey said they were very interested in learning more about how to assist employees with childcare by using state and federal tax credits.

To address that, the ELC task force is planning employer information sessions throughout the county starting in late May. Times, dates and locations will soon be announced.

Lamont called the survey a first and promising step for the new task force.

“It was important to have action items and not just talk about the problems,” said Lamont, who is also president and CEO of the Lakewood Ranch Business Alliance.

She added that she is encouraged by growing “community collaborations” between chambers, business leaders, developers, childcare providers and other advocates regarding the “trifecta” of overlapping crises in childcare, affordable housing and transportation.

“I think that is so special, that people are coming together,” Lamont said.

This story comes from a partnership between the Sarasota Herald-Tribune and the Community Foundation of Sarasota County. Saundra Amrhein covers the Season of Sharing campaign, along with issues surrounding housing, utilities, child care and transportation in the area. She can be reached at samrhein@gannett.com.

This article originally appeared on Sarasota Herald-Tribune: Survey shows Sarasota businesses hurt by childcare shortages, costs