If you caught the front page of the Democrat last week, you already know the news for parents seeking childcare in our county is bleak. 

The Hudson Valley as a whole has seen a 27 percent drop in the number of childcare facilities in the past 16 years, and Sullivan County holds the rather dubious title of leading the pack with a whopping 61.9 percent decrease in that same time period. 

Alone, this story is alarming. 

When placed beside the slew of hits Sullivan County’s young families have taken in the past 3 years, it becomes absolutely untenable. 

Allow me a quick recap. In the past few years, Sullivan County has seen ... 

1. Garnet closed its OB/GYN office in Harris. 

2. Garnet closed its outpatient pediatric office in Monticello.

3. Crystal Run Healthcare closed its OB/GYN office in Liberty. 

There are other OB/GYN and pediatrician offices, it’s true. But as with the drop in childcare providers, each slice has taken away critical services for the young families already here and tell a story for those we want to attract to our part of the country. 

Want to raise healthy kids? You need obstetric and pediatric care to do it. 

Want to keep a family afloat? Estimates from the Center for American Progress show two thirds of American kids have all parents at work, which means childcare is needed too. 

Not coincidentally, these three needs are also the very things would-be parents look for when they seek out a new place to live. 

Here’s what else they look for — signs that kids in their new home are succeeding. 

Many kids in Sullivan County are succeeding. As a parent of one of those kids, I have happy stories about local kids who are out there setting the world on fire. If I could, I would be out there singing their praises daily. 

But many is not all, and sadly the numbers tell us the larger story remains bleak. 

The latest Robert Wood Johnson Foundation’s (RWJF’s) County Health Rankings and Roadmap report shows 27 percent of Sullivan County’s kids live in poverty — a figure that’s 10 points higher than the national average of 17 percent — and 17 percent of our county’s teens aged 16 to 19 are neither in school nor holding down a job, a figure that’s also 10 points higher than the national average.

That same rankings report shows 80 percent of our county’s kids graduate from high school in four years, again lagging behind the national average — this time by 7 points. 

Perhaps most telling of all, however, is this statistic from the report: In Sullivan County, per-pupil spending is among school districts is $17,233 above the estimated amount needed to support students in achieving average US test scores.

That is more than $16,000 above the national spending for that same thing.

Let’s be clear — we aren’t spending more per pupil because those of us who live here have huge pocketbooks and even bigger hearts. 

We are spending $16,000 more per pupil because our student population is getting smaller and smaller, and the costs cannot be spread across a larger student population. 

We don’t have enough kids. 

We don’t have enough young families. 

And with each passing year, we lose more and more of the very things young families need to take root in a community, to register their kids in a community’s schools.