Staffing shortages at Kelowna daycares leaves 24 families without child care

Twenty-four Kelowna families found themselves in a childcare crisis this week.

Building Blocks Educare was forced to close two dozen infant/toddler spaces this week, when they were unable to maintain compliance with Child Care Licensing Regulations in and came up short on workers. Dealing with a shortfall, they had to give parents only a few days notice their childcare spots were going to disappear.

Finding a replacement is a tall order.  The waitlist for childcare in the Central Okanagan is anywhere from one to two years at the moment.

To address the immediate need, one of Building Block’s out-of-luck parents, who works in an essential service, flew in a parent from out of town to help as long as possible. It’s a stop-gap measure, at best. Others are looking at nanny-share systems. Others still don’t have answers.

Building Block owners Laura Forbes and Brie Elson said that they did everything they could to stay open. But the industry is in crisis and new regulations need to be adjusted to help providers through the staffing shortfall.

Interior Health Child Care Licensing’s role is to enforce the regulations, they said, and they have been handcuffed as well.

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“We all have to come together and find a solution to this crisis,” co-owner Brie Elson said in a statement.

“The answer can’t be to force the closure of spaces that our community depends on. Families are becoming the victims of a broken system. We are parents ourselves and started Building Blocks because we understand how crucial quality Child Care is. We have been providing care to Kelowna families for over 14 years and it is genuinely heartbreaking to have to tell our families that their spaces are closing.”

It’s not just Building Blocks Educare currently in this position, though they are one of the largest 0 to 5 years old childcare centres in the Central Okanagan, which makes the loss more noticeable.

Melissa Hunt is the executive director of Childhood Connections, which has helped families find the right care environment for their children and offered providers with training and resources since 1977. There are six programs in the Central Okanagan in a similar position, she said.

Some are closing spaces and others were unable to open spots expected to open after the Ministry of Family and Children Development announced they would, Hunt said.

“That’s 195 childcare spaces,” Hunt said.

There simply aren’t enough people willing to work for the wages on offer, she said.

“We are calling it a crisis for sure. It’s a huge societal issue. A lot of centres are looking for workers and aren’t able to offer a competitive wage.”

Worse yet, wages are all over the map and are creating a divisive situation as some use them lure childcare providers from one workplace to another, creating instability and an uneven playing field that Hunt explained is a disservice to both children and childcare providers alike.

“The NDP government has been working toward the $10-day plan. It would be wonderful to have a universal system of childcare,” Hunt said.

“To have consistency between private and non-profit programming and to equalize wages across the board would stop centres poaching from each other. It affects children who are attached to care providers, who leave when are lured to another shiny facility with greater wages.”

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Hunt pointed out that brain development in the 0 to 5 age group is particularly important, but the industry isn’t standardized like any other area of education.

Most in the industry agree, she said, but it’s hard to affect change from within particularly when wage disparity has caused local discord among those who should be working together to find a solution.

“We facilitate a childcare counsel table, trying to solve this crisis, but when people come to the table, knowing staff is leaving their centres, due to enticements from others, it’s hard to collaborate,” she said.

“It’s become a bit toxic. It’s no wonder the government has had to get involved.”

In July, Prime Minister Justin Trudeau announced at a stop in the Lower Mainland, that the federal government reached an agreement with the province in the amount of $9.2 billion to ensure families can have an average $10-a-day childcare within the next five years.

This will apply to all regulated spaces for kids under six years old. It’s set to create 30,000 more childcare spaces and is calculated to cut fees for those spaces by 50 per cent.

Trudeau’s commitment also comes with a $3.2-billion investment over three years from the provincial government.

Until that all falls into place, however, hundreds of families in the Central Okanagan are facing a difficult battle.