YMCA solves Whitley County daycare dilemma

COLUMBIA CITY, Ind. (WANE)--Finding the right daycare can be a struggle for many parents, but what happens when that right daycare closes?  That's the scenario parents of more than 100 kids in Whitley County had to deal with for several weeks after the largest daycare in the county closed.  The problem has been met with a solution thanks to help from the small community.

Friday was the last day for the largest daycare in Whitley County.  Monday, the Whitley County YMCA teamed up with parents and New Hope Wesleyan Church to start a new program, transferring many of the same volunteers and kids to that new program.

It’s an effort to meet a large need in the area.   New Hope Wesleyan Church now houses 40 displaced kids five and under during the day.  A parent-teacher task force helped organize the transition.  

Parents with kids in the program are thankful the community has teamed together in an area they said is lacking in daycare programs.

“The options when we found out that the daycare was closing were really quite limited,” said Julie Claxton, who has two kids in the new daycare.  “There's a couple small providers in town that had capacity for like six kids and there were 130 that were displaced.”

Many elementary-aged children have also been absorbed into the Whitley County YMCA's current programs.

Having the daycare at the church is only a short-term solution.  The Whitley County YMCA eventually hopes to have its own facility to provide for the larger daycare.