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Excerpt:

On Tuesday, the 5Boro Institute, a new think tank created by allies of the mayor, became the latest influential voice to call for change.

In a far-reaching report, the group said the city needed to take “immediate action” to save the system from collapse, including by filling widespread staff vacancies, boosting outreach to vulnerable families and raising wages for workers.

The city has also left hundreds of millions of dollars in state funding for child care on the table, it said.

“The sector overall is really in crisis,” Grace Rauh, the group’s executive director, said. “We are at a real inflection point.”

Ms. Cockfield, the mayoral spokeswoman, pointed to the administration’s creation of a new website to apply for child-care assistance that she said had helped 30,000 families, as well as efforts to clear a waiting list for vouchers and enroll more children.

The 5Boro Institute report acknowledged those steps, calling them “important,” but added that “we need to do more now.”