Darrell Greer
Northern News Services

Baker Lake (Mar 22/00) - No one could blame the staff at the Baker Lake Day Care Centre for being a bit worried and confused.

The day care is seeking funding from Kivalliq Partners in Development and submitted its proposal more than six months ago.

Christine Purse, who chairs the Baker Lake Day Care Committee, says she received a letter from Kivalliq Partners at the end of February stating there would be funding available soon and the organization would be hiring a co-ordinator to administer the funds. Purse wrote back asking for a more specific funding date. She is still waiting for a reply.

"This process has been dragging on since the end of May 1999," says Purse. "We're in danger of losing our day care and need to know where we stand."

Kivalliq Partners provided $20,000 in emergency funding to the Baker day care in October 1999, after it was forced to close its doors.

Salaries make up the centre's biggest expense and workers have taken a cut in pay to keep the doors open. The centre also increased its fees.

"A very rough estimate would be $5,000 a month to keep the day care operating. That would include salaries, snacks for the children, phone bill, anything that comes along in the normal course of doing business."

Staff at Kivalliq Partners would not comment, saying they were instructed not to deal with the media.

In response, Partners issued a brief press release.

"We are in the process of establishing guidelines for providing Inuit child-care spaces. The guidelines should be in place by May 2000," says the release.

"It should be noted that the resources being made available are to create a minimum 129 new child-care spaces. It is not intended to subsidize existing day-care facilities.

"In the past, the Government of the Northwest Territories/ Nunavut provided subsidies to day cares based on the number and age of children attending a facility.

"As an organization, our question is what happened to the subsidies offered by the GNWT and Nunavut Government?"

A full 98 per cent of the children attending the Baker centre are Inuit, as is 80 per cent of its full- and part-time staff.

Purse says the majority of the centre's clients are working parents who will have to find alternate sources of child care if the centre is forced to close.

"There's always more demand than people willing to look after children on a regular basis.

"We offer a structured and regular program with the stimulation of playing with other children, developing social skills and doing activities they might not otherwise have access to."