The COVID-19 pandemic created a major upheaval to an already fragile early care and education (ECE) system. As a result of the pandemic, families face additional challenges accessing care and child care providers are experiencing greater financial difficulties and struggling to keep their programs open. The pandemic has also exacerbated the racial, gender, and socioeconomic inequities within the child care system. Federal COVID-19 relief funds have been a critical support to keep ECE programs afloat and to ensure families can access care. As states strive to spend these funds in ways that support the child care industry and decrease these inequities, they must decide how to equitably distribute federal recovery funds to better support child care providers, as well as families that face greater barriers to accessing care due to systemic inequities. The purpose of this brief is to highlight some of the strategies states are pursuing to address equity in allocating their American Rescue Plan Act (ARPA) child care funds. It also provides a framework to support decision making around how to use recovery funds that focuses on the needs and preferences of families--particularly families that face barriers to accessing high-quality ECE.