Finding childcare just got easier. The YMCA of San Diego County has launched the area’s first free, countywide portal to connect families with care providers
What you’ll find at San Diego’s new portal, called childcaresandiego.com, is a free directory of thousands of local childcare providers and an easy-apply tool that lets you fill out your family’s info once and connect with programs — and apply for subsidies — with a few clicks.
No more typing “childcare” into Yelp or Google Maps and wondering whether businesses are paying for prime placement. Unlike on other platforms, businesses can’t pay to boost their placement.
This portal lists 5,758 childcare services, including all licensed childcare providers and some legally license exempt programs — such as before- and after-school programs. Summer and other school break camps are also listed. Along with program names contact info, the portal lists hours of operation, rates and whether or not they have open spots.
“This new platform is a game-changer for families, streamlining the process of selecting and connecting so families can focus on building new relationships with their care providers,” Kim McDougal, the senior vice president of social services with YMCA of San Diego County, said in a news release announcing the launch of the portal last week.
It is funded by the state, through the San Diego County Office of Education, and it is run by the YMCA’s Childcare Resource Service branch. Free childcare listings exist elsewhere, including in the city of Long Beach and part of Los Angeles County, but neither covers an entire county, said Laurie Han, who helps lead the resource and referral department at the YMCA Childcare Resource Service.
One more key feature: Families can apply for different kinds of financial assistance through the portal. That childcare subsidy application process can be tough to navigate, Han said, so being able to submit information to the YMCA’s portal and then apply on one platform helps people save steps.
“One thing that excites me a lot about it is that it’s the first time where families can easily find funded programs and not have to apply at 10 different locations,” Han said. “They can easily enroll in and submit their information to multiple programs through one platform.”
Along with parents, employers of working parents and childcare providers whose services are listed are all reaping the benefits of the portal, Han said.
Since the portal soft-launched in May, more than 2,000 families have used the tool to apply for subsidized childcare, and families connected more than 7,200 times with local childcare providers, Han said.
The YMCA also offers human helpers for people figuring out what kind of childcare to get or who need help with the application.
“The human touch is very valuable,” Han said. “Not everybody loves technology. And we find that especially families with new babies — their first babies — tend to really like having someone to talk to, to understand the childcare system. It’s all new to them.” Like the portal, that service is also free for everyone, not just YMCA members.
California parents can access a few kinds of government-funded financial support to pay for childcare. One kind is voucher-based and helps working families whose income is too low to allow them to afford the cost of childcare, and which meet other eligibility requirements.
A 2025 report by the nonprofit, nonpartisan Public Policy Institute of California found that “the full-time cost of preschool care is 6 percent to 18 percent — and infant care is 8 percent to 28 percent — of median incomes” in this state. That cost ranged from $9,000 to $24,000 annually across counties for preschool childcare, and ranged from $11,000 to $29,000 for an infant, in 2024. In San Diego County, infant care costs on average about $19,000 a year, the YMCA’s news release said.