Military families throughout the Commonwealth have the burden of finding quality and affordable child care. For military spouses, the burden is heavier when there is a lack of affordable child care options.

Many military spouses have left the workforce or stayed at home to care for their children because child care is either unavailable or too expensive. At a time when the cost of living is so high, most families have to rely on multiple incomes and a military spouse’s inability to work due to a lack of child care can greatly affect the financial wellbeing of the family.

Below you will find some child care resources and an upcoming DoD initiative to take advantage of, if eligible.

The Defense Department offers a dependent care flexible spending account (DCFSA) to help families pay for dependent care expenses. This benefit is available to active-duty service members and members of the Active Guard Reserve (AGR) on Title 10 orders, as well as DOD civilians.

A dependent care flexible spending account is a pretax account that you fund from your paycheck. The funds can be used to pay for eligible dependent care services, such as preschool, summer day camp, before- or after-school programs, and child or adult day care. Service members may contribute up to $5,000 per household per year to their DCFSA ($2,500 if married filing separate tax returns).

You can enroll online for a dependent care flexible spending account during the annual Federal Benefits Open Season, mid-November through mid-December, or when experiencing a qualifying life event.

For more information about this great benefit, click here!

For our Veteran and military families, Child Care Aware of Virginia is a community-based network of child care and early education specialists. They deliver services to families, child care professionals and communities, working to increase the accessibility, availability and quality of child care in Virginia. You can request Child Care Referrals via an online form or by calling 1-866-543-7852 and selecting Option 2.

October 19 - Naval Station Norfolk

November 1 - Fort Belvoir

November 2 - JB Myer Henderson Hall

November 9 - Langley Air Force Base

November 30 - Naval Air Station Oceana

December 7 - Naval Station Norfolk