By Rebecca Shalomoff
As of Jan. 11, the program will be canceled because there is not enough money to sustain it.
Parents now have to scramble to find new places for their young children to learn, play and socialize while they are at work. Caretakers and staff members have lost their jobs. And the children will be uprooted from an environment that for months and years has given them friendships, guidance and love.
There are so many people who are going to be affected by this, said Ruth Barton, day care director. I don't know what they are going to do.
In the last year, the all-day program, which caters to children 18 months to 5 years, has been running a $7,500 monthly deficit, community center director Jonathan Davis said. The board of directors decided the financial impact was too great considering that in the past two years the center has lost $300,000 in funding due to county-wide cuts and the day care program had to be canceled.
The deficit emerged because not enough children were in the program. During the course of several months, the enrollment dropped from 48 to 22. The day care center needs 33 children to offset the deficit, Davis said.
The day care program at the community center costs $200 per week for each child, Davis said. Most parents only pay part of the cost, and the Department of Social Services covers the rest.
Carole Ferrante, director of employment and child care at the Nassau Department of Social Services, explained that the reason enrollment at day care centers such as the Five Towns Community Center has dropped significantly is because of changes in the department.
Over a year ago, the department handling child care services increased its staff to deal with the heavy amount of casework.
For a long time, day care has been ignored, she said. It wasn't being done as thoroughly.
With an increase in staff, the department began enforcing eligibility requirements to receive financial coverage for day care which had previously been overlooked. For example, caseworkers began enforcing the requirement that single mothers file for child support from the baby's father.
The stricter enforcement of requirements for child care services turned many parents away from receiving the support they once had.
We need more support for families who can't afford to pay the full cost of child care, said Bernice Levin, director of the Peter J. DeSibio Child Care Center in Inwood. Local, state and federal governments need to help families have a quality setting for their children.
The DeSibio center, which is co-sponsored by the Five Towns Community Chest and the National Council of Jewish Women, Peninsula Section, provides parents who cannot afford to pay the full cost of day care with scholarships, Levine said.
Currently, there are 10 openings in the DeSibio center, the majority of which will be filled by children from the community center's day care program, Levin said.
Felicia Grady, whose daughter, Shania, 2, has been in the community center's program since she was 18 months, faces the problem of finding a new day care center.
A lot of day care centers only have slots available for three-year-olds, not two-year-olds, Grady said.
It has been convenient for her daughter to attend the program since they live a few blocks from the community center and because Grady also works in the center's Headstart Program, a federally-funded child care plan for 3-5-year-olds. But Shania is too young to enroll in the program.
Grady's concern is also the challenge it will be for Shania to leave her friends and adjust to a new environment.
It will be a difficult transition wherever she goes, she said.
When children are shuffled around, it has no consistency, no routine, and that's what very young children need, Levin said. They need good care in a trusting environment. It is an important time in a child's life. They shouldn't be shuffled from one setting to another. They deserve better.
