City sets sights on improving child care; New Westminster invests $20,000 towards preparing a new child-care strategy
The Record (New Westminster)
December 5, 2007 
By: Theresa Mcmanus

The Royal City hopes to have a better grasp of the community's needs and the gaps in child-care services by next summer.

Having committed $20,000 toward the preparation of a new child-care strategy, city council has now directed the city's social planner to prepare the strategy with the assistance of a task group made up of key stakeholders in the child-care field and other individuals.

"I am really looking forward to this," said Coun. Bill Harper. "I hope it moves along quickly so we can get some serious policies."

The City of New Westminster's Caring for Children child-care strategy was completed in 1995.

"During this time, the planning context in which the strategy was based has changed. The provincial and federal governments are not as active in this area as in the past, and there are increasing requests for municipal leadership and assistance," said a staff report. "The demand for licensed child care is also far outstripping supply, which means that more and more children find themselves in unlicensed, unregulated, child-care arrangements. Given the importance of child care, both from a social and economic perspective, this lack of licensed child care is threatening the city's high quality of life."

New Westminster city council supports the preparation of a new child-care strategy as a means of: defining the city's role and responsibilities in relation to the senior levels of governments; recommending policies and tools to enable the provision of new child-care spaces; identifying potential funding and partnership arrangements; and establishing child-care targets that can be regularly monitored and evaluated.

Coun. Lorrie Williams would like New Westminster to become a model to other communities in the area of child care.

"I think our citizens, a lot of them are young families, are asking for child care - good child care, affordable child care," she said.

Williams said the provincial government has "dropped the ball" and the federal government's answer has been to give families $100 a month for children under the age of six.

Coun. Bob Osterman said the process should include consultation with the New Westminster School District. He believes that every educational institution should have an onsite daycare centre.

"The real issue for parents is before- and after-school care," said Osterman, whose son is now an adult. "I can still remember the panic when you look for day care."

Stark, a member of the New Westminster Early Child Development Committee, hopes that's an area where some progress can be made.

Harper, who chairs the city's community and social issues committee, said credit goes to the committee for bringing forward a child-care strategy as a budget item for council's consideration.

"We waited for you to come, quite frankly," he told Stark, who started working for the city in the summer. "You have jumped on it."

Coun. Jonathan Cote, whose wife just had their first child, said they're already being warned to start putting their child on day-care waiting lists now.

"Child care is so critically important to our community and making our community attractive for young families," he said.

Cote hopes the process will analyze the gaps in services currently provided, identify where the city's needs are regarding child care and implement local policies.

Williams said the availability of affordable and reliable child care helps communities attract businesses and residents.

The strategy will be divided into three phases:

Phase 1 - information gathering. This phase, which is ongoing, will include a needs assessment, an inventory of assets and identification of gaps (types of child care and their location) and case study research that looks at other municipalities with child-care policies and strategies.

Phase 2 - policy and strategy development. This phase, which will be done from January to May 2008, will consider the current and desired role, existing polices and tools (a review of their effectiveness), possible tools and their applicability to New Westminster, and recommended policies and tools to facilitate the provision of child care spaces.

Phase 3 - monitoring and evaluation. This ongoing phase will consider the desired targets and timeframes for achievement, and ongoing monitoring and periodic evaluation of policies and tools.

The city's official community plan states that the city should: encourage the provision of child care as an essential community-based service; promote child care within the city by facilitating partnerships with the community; and consider the provision of child care in the context of planning by evaluating the need for child care in proposed developments.