A new report on childcare availability in Whistler gives officials a good basis to work from, but it’s not about to solve the issues overnight.
“I think it tells us what we know, and it gives us a good direction to start from—but I don’t think that it’s going to solve anything just [with] this report,” said Councillor Jen Ford, who has long been an advocate for increasing childcare spaces.
But it won’t be the Resort Municipality of Whistler’s (RMOW) burden to bear alone, either, Ford said.
“Truly, as we’ve always known, it needs to be a community effort, and a real collaboration,” she said.
“There’s so many pieces to it that I’m glad that it articulates that in this report.”
The Whistler Child Care Project Action Plan, as it’s called, details the current state of childcare in Whistler, projected needs under three different scenarios (decline, flat and growth), and action items for the future.
In particular, it presents 29 prioritized actions and a few non-prioritized actions to be considered, focusing on the two key areas of greatest need and the largest service gaps in Whistler: after-school care for school-age children; and full-time, facility-based group care for children up to three years of age.
The action items consider things like removing barriers for after-school home care programs, reviewing existing Whistler facilities for possible use as childcare spaces, developing a recruitment campaign for retired community members and exploring ways to offer early childhood education locally (to list just a few—the full report will be posted to whistler.ca/childcare).
But the report and its recommendations don’t go far enough, wrote Whistlerite Jesse Veenman, in a submission to council at the Aug. 18 council meeting.
Further, Veenman was disappointed to see no socioeconomic analysis was completed on how the lack of childcare disproportionately affects women.
“Overall, I find the report underwhelming in terms of suggesting real solutions to assisting childcare in Whistler,” she wrote. “I would like to hear from members of council on how they plan to increase investment and priority in childcare for Whistler families.”
At the Aug. 18 meeting, Ford noted that since the report was finalized, one local childcare facility has permanently closed its infant program, while another has not reopened since closing due to COVID-19—effectively costing the community more than 30 childcare spaces.
With that said, Ford introduced a motion to direct staff to investigate the feasibility of expanding the RMOW’s Kids on the Go after school program (a motion eventually passed by council).
Childcare is “a provincial mandate, absolutely,” Ford said, “but where the rubber meets the road is here in local government. We cannot fix this problem as a local government alone, we need the advocacy of the Whistler Chamber, of Vail Resorts, of all of the large employers in town right now who are looking for staff.
“We are in a childcare crisis and have been for a long time, and I thank you all for your support and collaboration and willingness … but we are just getting started.”
RMOW officials have requested a meeting with provincial Minister of State for Child Care Katrina Chen at the upcoming Union of BC Municipalities convention to discuss Whistler’s childcare needs, noted chief administrative officer Virginia Cullen, though the meeting hasn’t been confirmed yet.
In the view of Coun. Ralph Forsyth, who recalls discussing the dire state of childcare during his first stint on council in 2006, the main issue lies with certification, and making it easier for early childhood educators trained in different provinces or countries to work in British Columbia.
As for the issue of who is responsible for providing childcare, Forsyth said he would support Ford’s motion because of the pressing need, “but I’m very tired of having the provincial government knowingly, willingly, fully culpable in subjecting municipalities and the families in this province [to a lack of childcare], and then we get the emails and the letters saying ‘Why don’t you do something about it?’” he said.
“I’ve had enough. If we don’t get the meeting with the minister, let’s take some action and start shaming the ministries until they do something, because time is up.”
