Perry County families asked for better childcare options and community leaders listened. On Friday morning, the community will be introduced to its new nonprofit 24/7 childcare facility – Perry Childcare.
Perry County Chamber of Commerce Executive Director Lagina Gogel said there will be a ribbon cutting and open house beginning at 10 a.m. EDT Friday. The new facility is located at 1012 31st St. in Tell City.
Parents are encouraged to tour the building, which already has about 40 children enrolled.
“It really has been a combined community effort,” Gogel said. “It’s been a tremendous push to get this ready. We’re seeing a huge response already.”
In 2013, the Perry County Development Corp. distributed a survey to residents and a major concern identified was childcare for non-standard shift workers. Major employers in the area including Webb Wheel Products, Waupaca Foundry, Perry County Memorial Hospital, Startek, ATTC Manufacturing and WGS Global Services had members involved with the facility’s inception.
“It is a very nice facility, very unusual for our area to have a 24/7 (facility). There’s nothing like it available in the community,” Gogel said. “It’s going to serve a huge need.”
The facility will open Aug. 3 with the capability to care for 106 children ages 6 weeks to 12 years. Children can attend preschool four days a week without being enrolled in day care. Employees at the facility have all passed criminal background checks and received training.
“We are still in a fundraising mode,” she said. “Everything has been donated.”
Perry Childcare board president Bruce Tesh said businesses donated $225,000 in start-up funds, but an additional $75,000 is needed to support the facility in its early days.
Tesh is also the plant manager of Waupaca Foundry, which employs about 950 workers.
Perry County Development Corporation program manager Erin Emerson said her organization hosts quarterly meetings with area employers to discuss what the needs of employers.
Emerson said the need for childcare during non-traditional hours became clear. She learned from speaking with state officials there aren’t many facilities like this in the state.
“When we would tell them what we wanted to do they’d said ‘Oh, my gosh that is not easy,’” Emerson said.
Tesh said one of the major issues employers had with retaining workers was childcare for second and third shift workers. He said workers turn down or leave their jobs oftentimes because they don’t have anyone to watch their children.
“About three years ago we kicked around ideas on how we could as manufacturers and businesses support an existing childcare facility to expand their hours or find a provider to open one up and augment them with donations for startup,” Tesh said.
Many different options were examined, but Tesh said they all fell by the wayside.
“We didn’t give up,” he said. “We thought ‘Okay, we’re going to have to do this ourselves.’”
A 10-person board of volunteers was formed and a location was chosen. The board decided to lease a vacant facility from Southern Indiana Resource Solutions. SIRS used the building as a facility to provide care for children and adults with disabilities.
Tesh said the building will be renamed the Reed Building.
“This is open to anyone whether they work at one of the large manufacturers or not,” he said. “We like to call this for the community, by the community.”