MFRC day care funding announced
Mary Ellen Green
Staff writer
May 12, 2008
Children of military families gathered with B.C. Minister of State for Child Care, Linda Reid, and employees from the Esquimalt Military Family Resource Centre for the announcement of a new day care to open at the former Lampson Street School.
The halls of the former Lampson Street elementary school will soon echo lively voices of children once again. The provincial government announced $150,000 in funding to the Esquimalt Military Family Resource Centre (MFRC), which will double the number of spots in their pre-school day care program.
The announcement was made by B.C. Minister of State for Child Care, Linda Reid at the school, Thursday, May 8.
Lampson School is currently leased by DND and houses the Base Language Training Centre. The school closed last year due to declining enrolment in the Esquimalt area.
Three classrooms will each receive $50,000 in renovations to create 28 new child-care spots for military families. Upgrades also include landscaping and play areas for both the infant/toddler and pre-school programs.
According to Gaynor Jackson, Executive Director of the Esquimalt MFRC, there are currently 120 children on the waiting list for child-care programs; the average waiting period is eight months.
Leanne Kopp, MFRC board of directors’ chairperson, said, “Finding quality child care is an important issue for many families today. It’s an even bigger challenge for military families who have to find child-care that fits an ever-changing operational schedule.”
The day care will open early in the day and close late in the afternoon to accommodate the schedules of defence personnel. Staff is educated about the impact military lifestyle can have on children in order to better support children and their parents.
Construction work is slated to start in the fall, and could last about four months.
A total of 114 new child-care projects in 60 B.C. communities have received funding to assist with the costs of building new facilities, renovating leased buildings or expanding existing centres.
Since 2001, the provincial government has provided funding to support the creation of more that 5,500 licensed child-care spots in B.C., adding to the 87,000 spot currently available province-wide.
The $12.5 million funding announcement made last fall will help create more than 2,200 licensed spots in B.C. over the next two years, of which 311 will be on Vancouver Island.
The Esquimalt MFRC is one of 42 across the country. It currently runs a child care program in the Colwood Pacific Activity Centre and an out-of-school program for school-age children in Belmont Park.
