Palouse day care in danger of closing

Two dozen Palouse parents are working to find solutions to keep the only day care in town running.

The Palouse school district came close to voting to shut down the Little Sprouts Childcare and Early Learning Center at a special board meeting April 12.

More than 30 parents attended the meeting, many of whom had only learned the week before the day care was in danger of closing.

As a result of the special meeting, the school board approved a motion to create a task force that has until May 19 to find a day care model that would help the day care break even.

“Everybody pretty much agrees that no matter how it happens we all want a day care to stay in Palouse,” said Andra Edwards who has a three-year-old and a five-year-old in the day care.

The school district, which funds the day care, is considering shutting down the day care because the district is losing funds on multiple fronts.

State funding to the Palouse school has been cut twice this year. District enrollment is dropping, and the day care itself is seeing fewer participants, Superintendent Bev Fox said. The day care has always operated at a loss during its eight years. The deficit has increased this year.

“With the fund balance declining, the school board felt that we could not or should not withstand the deficit that was being presented by the day care,” Fox said. The day care was initially created to encourage Palouse families to keep their children enrolled in the Palouse school as they grew up.

Troubled by the board meeting April 12, more than 20 parents met four days later, April 16, at the Edwards home to hash out the direction they wanted to take to save the day care.

Edwards said the task force is now working at full speed to come up with a business model that would help the day care break even. The group of parents formed four committees. Three of these are researching details for a day care run as a non-profit, a day care run privately or letting the school retain the day care on a more cost-effective basis.

The special board plans to address the day care problem on May 19. The next two regular board meetings are April 28 and May 26.

Single father Jens Hegg has his six-year-old son in the day care. A graduate student, Hegg lives in Palouse and said the loss of the day care would be a blow to him.

“There are some people that face having to quit their jobs because there may not be day care openings in Pullman or Moscow,” Hegg said of other parents who have their kids in the day care. “If they can’t find a day care then they are in really big trouble.”

Roughly 28 families use the day care, which provides care for children not yet in school in addition to an after-school program for children already in school. The license allows for infants a month old to 12 years of age. It opened in 2003 and is the only day care in Palouse.

Edwards said she was very surprised to learn the board might vote to close the day care just a week before the meeting.

“I personally was a little bit caught off guard, and it was pretty stressful to hear that,” Edwards said.

At the April 12 meeting, the school board also voted to give Fox the authority to adjust the day care’s fee schedule.

“What the board gave me permission to do was apply that fee schedule maybe in a more stringent manner than what it has been,” Fox said.

Fox has changed the day care fees such that parents must sign up their children for full-time or part-time slots, versus hourly or daily rates.

“It will mean that parents will be paying more,” she said.