{"id":184681,"date":"2026-04-03T17:50:07","date_gmt":"2026-04-03T17:50:07","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/184681\/"},"modified":"2026-04-03T17:50:07","modified_gmt":"2026-04-03T17:50:07","slug":"cardi-b-pairs-with-city-hall-to-push-applications-for-free-nyc-child-care","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/184681\/","title":{"rendered":"Cardi B pairs with City Hall to push applications for free NYC child care"},"content":{"rendered":"<p data-block-key=\"03mac\">Rapper and Bronx native Cardi B is teaming up with Mayor Zohran Mamdani to encourage parents of 2-year-olds to apply for the city\u2019s free child care program starting in June.<\/p>\n<p data-block-key=\"ai7rj\">To help spread the word, the city is launching a jingle contest, asking New Yorkers to submit a 15- or 30-second original jingle encouraging families to apply. Cardi B will help judge the submissions and the winner will become the official theme for the 2-K program.<\/p>\n<p data-block-key=\"4md55\">\u201cChild care is very important. Sometimes us women can\u2019t really go forward because we don\u2019t have nobody to help us take care of our kids,\u201d Cardi B said in a <a href=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/watch?v=ygV693-o93Y\" rel=\"noopener nofollow\" target=\"_blank\">video announcement<\/a> alongside Mamdani on Friday.<\/p>\n<p data-block-key=\"esv28\">Mamdani is rolling out free care for 2,000 2-year-olds this fall as child care costs become a driving affordability concern and continues to push young families out of the city. On average, parents pay $20,000 a year for care.<\/p>\n<p data-block-key=\"becag\">Only parents in <a href=\"https:\/\/gothamist.com\/news\/these-nyc-neighborhoods-will-get-free-child-care-for-2-year-olds-first-mamdani-says\" rel=\"noopener nofollow\" target=\"_blank\">school districts 6, 10, 18, 23 and 27<\/a> will be eligible to apply as the program will begin in those neighborhoods before expanding in 2027. Parents can apply beginning June 2-26 and will be informed of their placements by August.<\/p>\n<p data-block-key=\"8oerl\">New Yorkers can submit their jingles to <a href=\"http:\/\/nyc.gov\/jingle\" rel=\"noopener nofollow\" target=\"_blank\">nyc.gov\/jingle<\/a> by April 17.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Rapper and Bronx native Cardi B is teaming up with Mayor Zohran Mamdani to encourage parents of 2-year-olds&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":184682,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[8],"tags":[9,56,63,65,64],"class_list":{"0":"post-184681","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-new-york-city","8":"tag-new-york","9":"tag-ny","10":"tag-nyc","11":"tag-nyc-headlines","12":"tag-nyc-news"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/184681","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=184681"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/184681\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/184682"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=184681"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=184681"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=184681"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}