NORTH LAS VEGAS (KTNV) — Channel 13 is following up on plans announced by officials in North Las Vegas one year ago.
In her State of the City address last year, Mayor Pamela Goynes-Brown mentioned plans to offer child care for the children of public safety workers employed by the City of North Las Vegas. The goal is to improve recruitment and retention by providing working parents a service that's become increasingly harder to find and afford.
One year after the mayor's speech, that child care center is getting ready to officially open up.
I got a chance to check it out as officials put the finishing touches on it.
Located near North Commerce Street and West Centennial Parkway, North Star Academy has six classrooms and can serve up to 64 students, from six weeks to five years old. Bright Horizonsis the service provider.
Initially, this was pitched as a service for the children of public safety employees. But officials decided to open it up to all city employees, recognizing the challenges many working parents face when it comes to finding childcare. According to a 2023 Childcare Policy Report from the Governor's Office of Workforce Innovation, 74% of Nevada children between 0 and 5 years old do not have access to licensed childcare.
"Do you think issues securing childcare have maybe prevented some people from taking employment opportunities with the city in the past?" I asked Wilson Ramos, the city's director of community services and engagement.
"100%," Ramos replied. "It's been really difficult. We have been considered, Clark County as a whole, a childcare desert. It has been an uphill battle trying to bring forth better providers, more facilitators for this, so it has been a prohibiting factor for individual employees, yes."
A father of three girls, Ramos said he knows firsthand the difficulty of securing childcare as a working parent.
It's not just availability that's a struggle for families looking for child care — it's affordability, too. I asked Ramos about the cost at North Star Academy, and he said the fees are competitive with other childcare centers in the area. City officials say the monthly tuition for employees at North Star Academy ranges from $500-$600 based on the child's age, and that they "compared how other high-performing organizations structure their childcare pricing and designed ours to include cost-sharing options that balance affordability with maintaining high standards of care."
Ramos said he believes employers offering wraparound services for their employees is the future, and that this is one way to tackle the difficulties many companies are facing right now when it comes to attracting and retaining the best.
"We wanted to offer another layer of services and opportunity for our employees. We figure if we serve our employees, then our employees can best serve our community," Ramos said.
He adds, he hopes North Las Vegas' counterparts will take this approach, too, and collaborate with providers to offer essential services to their employees.
For now, North Star Academy will serve younger kids of city employees, but officials plan to open it up to older students too, so they have care while they're on extended breaks from school, like summer vacation.
"So far, we've got a really good buy-in from our staff," Ramos said. "We've got a good set of individuals who are willing to participate as a pilot, if you will."
North Star Academy is set to hold its ribbon cutting on March 24 and begin gradually welcoming students the following day.
