LAKE PLACID — Lake Placid is on track to have new child care slots for kids under the age of 3-years-old through a pilot program at St. Agnes. In response to a request from the child care committee formed by the town, the town council voted unanimously on Tuesday to give $50,000 in occupancy tax funds towards the start up costs for the program.

Pending further funding, St. Agnes has committed to expanding their programing with two additional classrooms that will provide 22 total child care slots, according to child care committee chair Dean Dietrich and St. Agnes Principal Katie Turner, who both attended Tuesday’s meeting to present the current plan to the town council.

This will include one classroom with eight infants and another classroom with space for up to 14 toddlers. They will also need five classroom staff members.

Turner confirmed that St. Agnes has begun working on the licensure process. They will also need some renovations to meet state guidelines, including adding bathrooms in the classrooms, and making adjustments to furnishings and emergency exits. Most of the aspects of the licensure process are needed because of additional state guidelines, such as feeding schedules and diapering, that are needed for the younger age group.

St. Agnes has a long-standing policy for running their UPK program with no religious curriculum or programing, which will also be the case for the birth through three-year-old pilot program.

In terms of a timeline, Turner hopes they can have additional classrooms and staff ready for younger students by fall. She is confident the building renovations will be done, but the state license process can take some time.

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Finding, and filling, the gap

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Overall, Lake Placid is in a better situation when it comes to child care than many other communities, Dietrich said. For instance, the town has universal preschool, which is hosted at St. Agnes in a similar public-private partnership.

The birth-to-three age group, however, is particularly difficult to find child care for. There are currently no community slots in Lake Placid. Infants and toddlers cost thousands of dollars more per student each year than older kids, because of the higher teacher-to-student ratio required by the state for this age group.

“You could do two things,” Dietrich said. “You could raise the tuition of the other kids to kind of subsidize them. You could charge the new kids an exorbitant amount. Or you could do what this budget does and say, ‘we’re going to keep the tuition the same and we’re going to fill the gap any darn way we can.'”

This need was identified in a process that started in 2023, when North Elba formed the child care committee, including liaisons from the village and town and other stakeholders, such as Lake Placid Central School District Superintendent Tim Seymour. The committee engaged in more than a year of discussions and research, including a survey of the Lake Placid community.

This past fall, the committee approached Turner about hosting a pilot program for infants through 3-year-olds. The committee discussed pilot programs with other providers, but St. Agnes ended up being the best fit, Dietrich said.

“We were ecstatic,” he said, “because St. Agnes has all the things we need.”

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Next steps and needs

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Now, what remains is to raise money for the start-up costs and determine a fundraising and organizational structure that can help the program be sustainable long-term and perhaps even expand to other child care providers, Dietrich said.

St. Agnes is fortunate to have the empty classrooms available for this program, Turner said. The renovations, licensure fees, furnishings and other expenses add to a start up cost of around $180,000 to $200,000 for the pilot program.

Turner said St. Agnes is already planning to apply for a Generous Acts grant from the Adirondack Foundation and will continue fundraising on its own. However, the committee is working on assembling a committee for a community-wide fundraiser, similar to the Thrive and Thrift food pantry and thrift shop fundraiser.

There is also funding available to families through state subsidies. For example, a family of four is eligible for subsidies with an annual income of up to $108,631. For more information about help paying for child care, visit tinyurl.com/4wu64mnc.

“We found out that a lot of people are not taking advantage of the subsidies,” Dietrich said.

In addition to fundraising, the committee is now seeking a fiscal sponsor to manage the disbursement of funds. This job could theoretically be done by any 501(c)3 nonprofit, but Turner said they have a few candidates in mind whose missions closely align with the committee’s work towards better child care access in Lake Placid and surrounding areas.

Katie Brennan, a village of Lake Placid trustee who is a member of the child care committee, said this project will be an important step in making Lake Placid a better place to live. It’s a topic that has come up frequently in the comprehensive plan process.

“We want this to be a community that people can get all of the amenities they need at all stages of life,” Brennan said. “And having children who are zero to three is definitely one of them for a lot of people.”