A task force made up of School District 43 and city officials will soon take on the challenge of finding solutions to the Tri-Cities’ daycare crunch.
Tuesday, the SD43 board of education agreed to take on the initiative after a staff report detailed ongoing issues and challenges — including private daycares needing to use the playground and washrooms at Moody elementary school.
“This is a prevalent challenge across the district and we need to come up with strategic plan,” said board chair Kerri Palmer Isaak.
Palmer Isaak, the trustee for Anmore and Belcarra, said terms of reference will soon be drafted by district staff, and city councillors and child care organizations will be invited to participate because the community and councils have a role to play in coming up with solutions for more daycare spaces to meet demand.
The decision comes after a meeting between SD43 and the mayors of Coquitlam, Port Coquitlam and Port Moody — as well as Education Minister Rob Fleming and Minister of State for Child Care Katrina Chen — in late August held to get answers about new provincial money for daycare spaces.
“Long term, the bottom lines is we need more space," Palmer Isaak said. "We all have little pieces of this pie and we need to put them together so we have better understanding.”
One recent concern is children and staff from five daycares in the St. Johns Street corridor are showing up at Moody elementary as school is letting out in the afternoon to use equipment and washrooms, resulting in concerns about safety.
Arrangements have been made to allow school staff to identify the adults and children, and to make sure the visits don't happen just as students are coming out of the classroom. But the situation is not ideal and is arising because of the need for space and the fact daycares are now opening in storefronts with little or no outdoor space, Palmer Isaak said.
"We were really struggling to accommodate a number of daycares at the elementary school site after school who were bringing young daycare children after school time and us trying to dismiss our own students safely at the same time."
Working with city councils could prevent some of these issues and promote communication and collaboration, Palmer Isaak said, noting that a large daycare was recently approved near the planned Sheffield elementary school in Coquitlam when the district was looking at putting a child care centre in there as well.
“We have just learned about that at the district. That is something we should be talking about and collaborating more with the municipalities."
Already there have been efforts to work together, she said, suggesting that collaboration could result in some "creative solutions" for establishing more daycares and the task force will look at models in other cities where school and city officials are working together on projects.
The district is also looking at its own facilities to see if more space can be found for daycares; a staff report said there may be opportunities to move a daycare into Moody middle’s neighbourhood learning centre and on a large site at Porter Street elementary school.
Moody has not been able to attract arts-related organizations for its neighbourhood learning centre while Porter has space but, because of enrolment growth in the area, it might be needed in the future.
