Owner Cynthia Matthews said she and other Jackson County day-care operators would not have been able to reopen so quickly if it had not been for Chevron Products Co. Refinery, based in Pascagoula. She said Chevron spent $25,000 to get her restarted. The corporation put up $500,000 to repair and open damaged day-care centers in Jackson County.
Chevron, Save the Children, an independent organization, and private donors are working across the Mississippi Gulf Coast to reopen licensed day-care centers. There were 187 licensed coastal day cares with a maximum of 16,631 children before the storm, according to the Mississippi Department of Health. The department licenses centers that care for at least five children.
Since the storm,108 day-care centers holding a maximum of 8,292 children have reopened. That leaves 79 centers closed and as many as 8,399 children without a day-care center, according to Health Department records.
"I've talked to a number of people south of the (CSX railroad) tracks who have said they won't rebuild in that area," said Jim Craig, director of the Health Department's division of health protection.
Cathy Grace, director of the National Center for Rural Early Childhood Learning Initiatives at Mississippi State University's Early Childhood Institute, assessed the Coast's licensed day-care centers to determine what they need. She said Chevron asked her to help after the corporation determined more employees would return to work if they had a place to take their children.
Chevron spokeswoman Amy Bradenstein said employees and residents suggested that Chevron come up with a way to help parents solve child-care problems. So far, it has helped 35 of Jackson County's 66 licensed day-care centers reopen by paying for cleaning, reconstruction and furnishing.
Maria Nelson, who owns Little House of Wonders in Pascagoula, thinks she will reopen Tuesday. A construction crew hired by Chevron is rebuilding her day-care center, which flooded.
Nelson thinks Chevron has spent at least $40,000 to rebuild and furnish her day-care center. She said she didn't have flood insurance and didn't know how long it would have taken to get money to pay for reconstruction. Meanwhile, parents have been calling and asking her when she would reopen.
Chevron now is helping Save the Children organize a plan to reopen Harrison County day-care centers. Ellen Jorgensen of Save the Children said 52 of the county's 109 licensed day cares are open and can take 3,809 children. Four more centers are expected to reopen this month, and three others are to open in December. Thirty-two centers were destroyed.
Jorgensen said the organization thinks it's going to take at least $4 million to get all the county's licensed day-care centers rebuilt. So far, it has $1 million.
Two of Hancock County's 12 day-care centers have reopened, one of which is at Stennis Space Center and is available only to employees there. The other, Little Acorn Child Development Center in Bay St. Louis, usually serves low-income families and takes as many as 42 children, ages 1 to 5.
"We are taking anyone now," said Lora Mederos, executive director of the Hancock County Human Resources Agency. "It is the key to economic development. Parents need a place for their children to stay while they are going back to work."
A group of donors from Bucks County, Pa., has raised about $600,000 to help Bay St. Louis, Waveland and Hancock County recover. Plans include the construction of a child-care center, which could take a maximum of 124 children, from infants to 5-year-olds, Mederos said.
Grover Friend, the Bucks County group's facilitator, said child care is among several critical issues that need to be addressed to help the area recover. The donors also want to help the school systems, doctors, lawyers and families.
Parent Lisa Wells of Gautier knows how important day care is to economic recovery. She said she lost her job at a Biloxi doctor's office because she didn't have a place to take her 1-year-old daughter, Katelynn, after the storm.
Wells said she will start a new job at the end of the year. In the meantime, she's helping at her daughter's day care at Calvary Baptist Church in Pascagoula, which recently reopened.
Johnny Beaver, pastor at Calvary Baptist, said floodwaters destroyed the day care. He and day-care director Pam Eubanks said they didn't know how they would repair it. Eubanks said she expects to have to get a loan.
Chevron officials paid to have the 24-year-old day care cleaned, repaired and furnished. Eubanks said she thinks the corporation paid at least $108,000.
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