A plan to build up to 12 new child-care facilities on Burnaby school district lands got the school board’s stamp of approval Tuesday.
At a regular public meeting, trustees unanimously approved a memorandum of agreement with the City of Burnaby that will see the municipality fund construction of the new centres while the district supplies the land and manages the operation of the facilities by non-profit child-care providers.
With school-board approval, work on the first facility is expected to begin in 2015.
The plan will add up to 500 childcare spaces to the district’s existing 777 spaces at 21 centres across the district.
The city already operates five child-care centres with a total of 232 spaces.
Over the coming years, the city will place the centres in modular buildings on school lands without any cost to the school district, according to a report at Tuesday’s meeting.
Trustee Larry Hayes called the plan a “real win-win for the community and all involved.”
Trustees Harman Pandher agreed, lauding the partnership between the board and city hall.
“It’s a relationship that will open up to 12 much-needed child-care sites across Burnaby with up to 500 child care spaces allowing even more of our parents to go to work secure in the knowledge that their children will be cared for by qualified professionals in a warm, nurturing environment at the very neighbourhood school that they’re either already attending or will be attending in the future,” he said.
Trustees were on hand Monday at city hall when council put the first signature on the deal, and councillors returned the favour Tuesday, with councillors Dan Johnston, Paul McDonell, Colleen Jordan, Pietro Calendino and Anne Kang in attendance.
Parks and recreation commissioner Katrina Chen, who is running for a trustee seat under the Burnaby Citizens Association (BCA), was also on hand to pose in a group photo after the agreement was signed.
Asked about the timing of the announcement in the middle of an election campaign in which all the trustees and councilors on hand were also BCA candidates, school board chair Baljinder Narang said it was just a good-news story the board wanted to tell.
“For optics it looks like it’s related to this, but, you know, in fairness, we have been working on this for two years,” she said. “Are we doing this for the campaign? We’re saying we’re conducting school business. Yes, timing is great, but that’s when it’s come to a conclusion.”
Although Narang was unclear how Chen was involved in the agreement as a parks and rec commissioner, the board chair said it was protocol to recognize any commissioner at a civic event.
“If other commissioners had decided to attend, they would have come up as well,” Narang said.
