A newly released public record from the Oregon Secretary of State’s Office indicates Multnomah County’s former Preschool for All director turned students away from participating in a state-funded program at the preschool she owned, even amid chronic underenrollment. Leslee Barnes, who resigned as the county’s preschool and early learning director on July 31, owns a preschool in North Portland called Village Childcare Enterprises LLC. That preschool was one of four cited as an example in a recent state investigation of Preschool Promise, a state-funded program providing subsidized child care to low-income families, as WW first reported. Between 2020–21 and 2022–23, Village Childcare collected $833,494 from the state to serve just nine children.
