Negotiations over a leasing agreement has left a brand-new daycare in College Heights in limbo.
The new daycare at 8008 Malaspina Ave. is to be operated by Kool Cats Kid Care run by the College Heights Community Association.
However, the new building, completed in January, has been sitting empty as the City of Prince George and School District No. 57 (SD57) negotiated a leasing agreement, which SD57 has now declined.
“There's a lease agreement that we don't think is going to be feasible for us moving forward,” said acting superintendent Pam Spooner.
Spooner said the district’s priority is its current childcare programs.
The district has six community-run childcare programs providing145 spaces for children from zero to five and 14 community-run programs providing 400 before-and-after-school care spaces for children five to 13, as well as early learning Strong Start programming.
“We stress that we totally understand the importance of helping our community with respect to childcare and we and we look forward to positive relationships moving forward with the city and with any partner groups with respect to childcare,” added Spooner.
She noted that SD57 is also working on a number of its own grant applications to expand its childcare services.
Jean Petrovic, administrator with Kool Cats Kid Care, says the city wanted SD57 to lease the facility, and then have Kool Cats sublet it from them.
Petrovic said she had hoped they would be able to open the building back in February or maybe March but they are still waiting.
She says it would take about a month for operators to set up their equipment, staff, and inform families once they are given the green light to enter the building.
“We have families on the waitlist, a huge number of families,” explained Petrovic.
There are about 200 families on the waitlist for 24 infant and toddler spaces and 180 families on the waitlist for 25 three-to-five-year-old spaces.
“The parents have been waiting. Some of them want to go back to work and they can't go back to work because they don't have childcare and they are on their waitlist.”
Petrovic noted Kool Cats Kid Care also has staff they’ve promised will have a job once the daycare is open, some of which have had to move onto new opportunities.
“Everyone is stressed that’s involved because we are just waiting for this to happen.”
The project began back in 2021, when the College Heights Community Association and the City of Prince George successfully applied for the province’s new childcare spaces grant, receiving $2,998,818 to build a second Kool Kats Kid Care location, a budget which the province eventually increased to nearly $5.14 million.
A spokesperson for the City of Prince George has declined to comment on the situation at this time.
