CARLYLE - For the first time since the late 1990s, the town of Carlyle has been approved for childcare spaces by the provincial government.
A day care co-operative has been formed and its members are working feverishly to have a temporary facility open by early 2023.
The newly-formed organization will be well established, fully staffed and fully prepared for when a new facility is built. Carlyle residents are hopeful that the announcement of a new community multi-use event centre complete with a new school and accompanying day care will take place in the spring of 2023. This would likely take two to three years to construct.
The province is allotting 28,000 newly regulated childcare spaces and the Town of Carlyle has recently been awarded 30.
Nicole Turgeon is the chairwoman of the newly-formed co-operative, to be known as the Carlyle Cubs Learning Centre.
“I am the parent of a two-year-old with another one on the way. The Town of Carlyle has been woefully short of day care providers for years and a new day care facility for our community is long overdue. Many local parents must drive their kids to out of town facilities, or remain on wait lists for local care options, which is time consuming, expensive, and stressful. Parents like me are really looking forward to making this co-operative a low cost and feasible alternative.”
The co-operative has decided to lease the property known as the old Archie Liable acreage on the east side of town.
“We looked at several properties in Carlyle and felt that this acreage was the most appealing. It has been recently renovated and requires a minimal number of upgrades to bring it up to provincial standards. It is a good drop-off and pick-up point for parents with its own private lane. It has a lot of green outdoor space.”
With 30 child-care spaces authorized, it is estimated that the co-operative will require up to a dozen employees including a day care director. Excluding the director, all new hires will be offered on the job training to acquire their early childhood education certificates if a potential applicant doesn’t already have this education.
The co-operative members are hopeful a government consultant will be visiting the selected location in the next few days to formally determine the exact number of childcare spaces available, which is based on square footage. It is the co-operative’s intention to open the facility from 6 a.m.-6:30 p.m. daily to cope with shift workers and irregular working hours.
The Carlyle Cubs Learning Centre is in the process of adding both a website and social media pages. Once spaces are formally approved, employment and childcare registrations will be accepted with a projected start-up date of early 2023.
“All of us are really excited to making this dream of a fully approved day care facility a reality for the Town of Carlyle. Our board consists entirely of moms and our committee wish to thank a couple of residents for their assistance. We extend a big thank-you to Judy Valentine for unselfishly contributing her background experience in the day-care industry and to Jared Riddell for bringing us together and his business expertise,” Turgeon said.
