Child care concerns; Jumbo, etc
The Daily Bulletin - Kimberley
19 Sep 2006
Opinion -- By: Gail Brown, for the East Kootenay Childhood Coalition

The East Kootenay Childhood Coalition is a team of people representing families, communities and service agencies throughout the East Kootenay. We are working to provide a region where families can easily find and access a complete system of childhood development services and where children can develop to their fullest potential.

Our Coalition is concerned about the lack of child care spaces in the East Kootenay Region. This large rural area is located in the south-east corner of British Columbia. There are eight communities in this region.

Families in our region are struggling to locate child care in the East Kootenay Region.

The reasons are:

- A comprehensive rural child care plan and system is required to meet this area's needs for child care services;

- Child Care centres and family day cares are closing;

- The costs of re-starting child care services are high;

- Qualified Early Childhood Educators are not available;

- There are no capital funds to build new child care facilities and land/building costs are increasing rapidly;

- The birth rate in the East Kootenay area is increasing, placing increased demand for child care spaces;

- Enrolment in the ECD Program at College of the Rockies has never been lower;

- There are increasing levels of needs for child care by families with children who have special needs.

The East Kootenay Childhood Coalition is asking our governments to:

- Maintain current federal/provincial agreements to build a flexible, quality affordable early childhood system that serves all families with a range of community programs including day care centres, family child care homes, pre-schools child-minding emergency care, parent-child activities, respite care, family resource programs, and out of school care;

- Increase the existing child tax benefit for low income families;

- Provide federal/provincial agreements that put needed child care services into our rural communities

We know that these young lives are our future and that our investments in the early years are good ones. The East Kootenay Childhood Coalition and the communities it represents are ready to move forward in planning and implementing a new plan for child care. Our coalition is experienced in regional planning, community planning, research, advocacy and pilot project implementation. Please include us in your future planning for child care in the East Kootenay Region.