Expanded Childcare Hours

Nanaimo has real childcare capacity, but the hours do not match the shifts the people who need childcare work. A nurse starting a shift at 6:15 AM, a paramedic on a rotating schedule, a hospitality worker closing at 11 PM, all rely on childcare arrangements that the standard weekday model does not cover. The next council can address the hours problem directly.

Commitments

Pilot an expanded-hours childcare program from 6 AM to 8 PM, seven days a week. Publicly subsidized, with location and marketing focused on healthcare shift workers though open to all families. This is the core proposal. The exact number of spaces and the phasing across the four-year term depend on uptake, but the pilot needs to be large enough to be a meaningful test rather than a token gesture.

Deliver the pilot through cooperation with existing providers where a subsidy makes expanded hours viable. Where existing providers cannot or will not extend, deliver the pilot directly through the Parks and Recreation department. Both routes are on the table, and the pilot's design should not commit to one before the operator conversations have happened. A modest subsidy to willing existing operators is the cheaper path if it works. Direct delivery is the fallback if it does not.

Use every indirect municipal lever available. Zoning that allows childcare in more locations. City-owned land contributions where a site suits a childcare facility. Permitting fee waivers for licensed childcare development. These are the tools council directly holds, and they should be applied in support of the expanded-hours pilot rather than left in reserve.

Align the pilot with the provincial $10-a-day childcare program where the eligibility rules allow. The provincial program is a positive step, and it excludes many parents whose incomes or work arrangements fall outside its rules. The municipal pilot is intended to complement the provincial program, not to replace it, and its subsidy structure should be designed to reach the families the provincial rules currently miss.

Partner with School District 68 for before-and-after school care. Working families with school-age children face the same shift-work versus school-schedule mismatch, and the school district holds the physical space, the staff, and the safeguarding capacity a municipal partnership can build on. Council's role is to be the party that opens the conversation, and to fund the municipal share of any pilot that emerges.

Anchor the pilot around shift-worker families while keeping it open to all. The location, the hours, and the marketing focus on healthcare shift workers because that is the workforce Nanaimo's healthcare vision depends on retaining. Any family that meets the eligibility criteria is welcome. A childcare program that fits nursing shifts also fits paramedic shifts, hospitality shifts, and public safety shifts, and the design should not exclude families whose work does not carry the same profile.