Nelson City council is taking a proactive approach to addressing a major problem affecting the community. Not usually viewed as a municipal responsibility, the city is exploring the possibility of setting up child care services in vacant part of city hall. The idea is still in the infant stages being looked at, and right now Mayor John Dooley says can’t say how the  initiative would be paid for. Dooley says the service would be made available to parents who work for I-H-A, BC Government, City of Nelson. He says the service would help attract and retain new employees.

From Today’s Province Newspaper

A bitter battle over childcare ended yesterday with the NPA-dominated Vancouver city council axing the city’s 15-year-old Childcare Design Guidelines in favour of lowering regulations to provincial standards.

A report from the director of social planning recommended council establish an appeal mechanism that would maintain the current guidelines while allowing some buildings to be retrofitted for daycare spaces in neighbourhoods where those guidelines can’t be met.

The report cited international studies that found Canada’s quality of childcare is lower than in most other developed countries, with Vancouver’s guidelines an exception.

The key difference between the city’s and province’s standards is the visibility of green space from childcare facilities, a prerequisite for daycare zoning in Vancouver that led to a lease loss for a prospective Yaletown childcare provider over a year ago.

But some on council cited the Yaletown case as an example of Vancouver’s tougher zoning bylaws, forcing would-be inner-city providers out of Vancouver, contributing to the city’s already dismal wait-list problem.

"What we want is to have certainty for [daycare-provider] applicants so that parents have certainty of daycare space before they’re clapping at their children’s graduation," said NPA Coun. Kim Capri.

Civic opposition parties Vision Vancouver and COPE supported the staff recommendation for the formation of an exemption-granting committee, while still aiming to uphold the city’s historically more stringent standards.

But following an angry debate, the NPA defeated the recommendation 6-5.

The NPA then voted to do nothing for at least a year about Vision Coun.

Raymond Louie’s motion to have studies done assessing childcare needs in Vancouver, how to achieve a five-per-cent drop in spaces and how to develop a centralized wait list for spaces.

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