YMCA closes two daycares
MetroValley Newspaper Group / Richmond Review
15 Jun 2006
EXCERPT

A rent hike of $117,000 has forced the YMCA to shut down its child care services at two local schools, and only a last-ditch effort appears to have spared the operation at a third.

Bill Stewart, president and chief executive officer of the YMCA of Greater Vancouver, told The Richmond Review the closure ... is a direct result of the Richmond School District's decision earlier this year to increase the rate for renting space in its schools.

Before the rent hike, the YMCA was already subsidizing its Richmond operations, Stewart said.

But now, he said, the YMCA simply can't absorb another $117,000 in rental increases.

"From our perspective, any loss of child care spaces is too many," Stewart said...."

Stewart says some 40 local families had their childcare services subsidized by the YMCA because they simply couldn't afford to pay. That subsidy amounted to between $20,000 and $25,000 last year.

Now those families are not likely to find child care they can afford elsewhere, he said.

According to Stewart, these two child centres operate in "economically challenged" areas, and organizers believe the numbers have dipped to less than half because of the fee increases the YMCA has introduced to offset the rent hikes.

The YMCA's childcare service at Brighouse Elementary was also on the brink of being cancelled because of a shortage of parents, but a surge of last-minute sign-ups following an appeal to parents means the YMCA Kids Club will likely continue there in September after all.

Stewart said the YMCA sent its complete financial statements from each of its dozen child care operations in Richmond to school trustees last week, but as of Tuesday, no word had been received from the Richmond School District.

News that the before- and after-school care YMCA program at Brighouse was being cancelled due to a lack of enrolment caused plenty of consternation at the school.

"They (parents) were upset that this was so late in coming," said Brighouse Elementary principal Gillian Rudge.

The news prompted some parents to enrol their children at other schools with the child care services they needed, but a last-ditch effort to get more parents to enrol in the program saved it.

Trustee Sandra Bourque said she empathizes with the plight of parents desperate for affordable day care.

"I'd love to be able to solve the daycare problem ...(but) the school board can't do it," she said.

Bourque said she had to sacrifice her career aspirations--she has a master's degree in zoology--to have children because there wasn't day care available. Had there been, she could have had her family and a professional career too.

Bourque said her mandate as a trustee is to look out for kids from Kindergarten to Grade 12.

"It's not my business as a school trustee to look at the financial affairs of businesses that operate in our schools."

The school board's decision to increase rent rates to $6 per hour, Bourque said, was a reasonable decision. She noted that amount is still in the lower quarter charged by all other regions in the Lower Mainland.

She believes universal day care is the answer and that senior levels of government need to take care of funding that.

"I think society needs to give its head a shake."

Without access to appropriate daycare, women are in some cases still being forced to choose between having a family and a career....