Child care services were expected to be back operating Thursday at the Ray-Cam community centre in the Downtown Eastside after the Labour Relations Board brokered an agreement between striking civic workers' union and the city.

Even before the deal was struck today, the union had voluntarily agreed to lift its picket lines at Ray-Cam.

"I guess I'm looking at it as a goodwill gesture," Paul Faoro, president of Canadian Union of Public Employees, Local 15, said in an interview, calling the union's decision to allow the Ray-Cam Community Association at 920 East Hastings Street to operate its day care during the strike an "extraordinary measure."

"We heard the concerns of the parents and we looked at it and we stepped outside the box. We said, Look, we care about the community and we hope the community sees it as that,'" he said.

Faoro said the union was also hoping the decision would act as a catalyst to get city negotiators back to the bargaining table.

About 2,500 CUPE 15 workers, representing the city's inside staff and Ray-Cam staff, have been on the picket lines since July 23. That has meant a near-complete shutdown of the association's services, which target the needs of children, youth and seniors living in the city's gritty urban core.

Only 15 spaces for the facility's most at-risk children have continued to operate during the strike under a temporary essential-service order.

The City of Vancouver filed an application today to the LRB to declare the centre an essential service. But rather than ruling on the application, the LRB convinced the parties to make a deal that will allow services for special-needs children to be restored and for Ray-Cam Co-operative Centre to offer day care, summer children's programs and a meals program.

"We're very pleased that Ray-Cam will be able to reinstate these services for children and families in the Downtown Eastside," Vancouver park board general manager Susan Mundick said in a news release. "However, it's unfortunate that job action will continue to affect thousands of other children and families across the city."