A house bill proposes a child tax credit that can help better economic security

• According to the 2024 Kids Count, Michigan's families seen an increase of K-12 economically disadvantages children.
• A proposed house bill, that would fall in line with 15 states, would bring a state-level tax credit to Michigan families.
• Video shows a local organization working to decrease that statistic with their own efforts but advocates say the state can help out as well.

"We have gone from serving 20 to 25 families a week to serving 80 to 100 families per week," Thomasma said.
From diapers to clothes and health service support, Child and Families Charities CEO Julie Thomasma created the Family Growth and Resource Center to give our neighborhood families the items they need to succeed.

WATCH INTERVIEW WITH CHILD AND FAMILIES CEO JULIE THOMASMA

"We're Just always looking at how we can support our families at overall, through basic needs and other things they might need," Thomasma said.

While they are helping bringing families in, they are also seeing a glaring issue.

"We've learned coming out of Covid a lot of families just need a little bit of economic support."

And the numbers back it up.

A newly released report on Michigan children and families says the number of children in our neighborhood schools who are economically disadvantaged increased from 50 to 53 percent.

So state legislators are looking to lower that from the start.

House Bill 5807 introduces a 500-dollar tax credit to Michigan families for each child in the household.

"15 states have already adopted a state-level child tax credit, Michigan so far is not one of them," Kuhnen said.

When COVID-19-related government programs were discontinued, KIDS COUNT Policy Director Anne Kuhnen said the economic security of Michigan families who were reliant on the programming were affected.

WATCH INTERVIEW WITH KIDS COUNT POLICY DIRECTOR ANNE KUHNEN

"It's very important that states step up and say we can do this for the kids in our state," Kuhnen said.

Until then, Child and Families charities will continue to support our neighborhood families to succeed.

"We will continue putting people in our programs so that they have a full village around them and a community that really does care," Thomasma said.

The bill has been recommended to the House Committee on tax policy for recommendation.

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