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Thousands of Seattle child care workers will get Covid "thank you" cash

caption: Seattle Preschool Program teacher Hien Do, center, dances with her students on Wednesday, June 28, 2017, at the ReWA Beacon Hill Early Learning Center in Seattle.
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Seattle Preschool Program teacher Hien Do, center, dances with her students on Wednesday, June 28, 2017, at the ReWA Beacon Hill Early Learning Center in Seattle.
KUOW Photo/Megan Farmer

About 3,500 Seattle child care workers will get holiday gifts from the city - as much as $835 each to thank them for caring for the city’s kids during the pandemic.

The $2.9 million in federal Covid relief funds will go to workers at 537 child care centers and family home providers across Seattle.

Most of the facilities are in lower-income parts of the city, and the recipients are overwhelmingly women of color.

Seattle Mayor Jenny Durkan called child care workers some of the “city’s frontline heroes” and thanked them for providing “safe learning environments and support when families and children needed it most.”

The city says the chosen child care providers should be handing out checks to their workers by the end of the year.

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Workers will receive checks at these Seattle child care facilities

List from Seattle Department of Education and Early Learning

Correction 12/8/21 1:35 pm: An earlier version of this story misstated the selection criteria for the payments.

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