Hermiston herald., February 20, 2019, Page A3, Image 3

LOCAL
Wednesday, February 20, 2019
HerMIsTOnHeraLd.COM • A3
Finding child care providers a challenge in Umatilla County
By JAYATI RAMAKRISHNAN
STAFF WRITER
Leaving a child in some-
one else’s care can be stress-
ful for any parent, but it can
be amplified by the chal-
lenges many families face
finding a child care provider
in the first place.
Local parents said while
there are providers avail-
able, it can be tough to find
one that meets their needs,
including scheduling, price
range, or the type of experi-
ence they want their child to
have.
Rosa Holt, a mother to a
4-month-old boy, said find-
ing a provider who works
with her schedule has been
the biggest challenge.
Holt, a nurse at Good
Shepherd Medical Cen-
ter, started sending her son
to the on-site day care at
Good Shepherd as soon as
she returned to work. She
said they were reliable, and
she liked that they did edu-
cational activities with even
the youngest children. But
the hours weren’t condu-
cive to her schedule, and she
eventually began sending
her son to a private provider
in Echo, where the schedule
was a bit more flexible.
“As a nurse, in the medi-
cal field, we’re always work-
ing,” she said. “Nurses who
work the night shift have
nowhere to send their kids.”
For Casey White-Zoll-
man, the vice president of
public relations at Blue
Mountain Community Col-
lege, the biggest challenge
was simply finding someone
to watch her infant son. He’s
now 2 years old, but he has
been cared for by a nanny
since he was 7 months old.
Though they looked at day
care options, White-Zoll-
man said there was a lack of
availability with providers
who watch children under a
year old.
Even for toddlers, she
said, many places require
children to be toilet-trained,
something White-Zollman
said was a little premature
staff photo by e.J. Harris
Assistant Charlene Carnahan reads from the book “Have You Got My Purr?” to a group of children at Busy Bees Day Care on
Friday in Hermiston.
for her 2-year-old son.
She and a colleague
ended up doing a “nanny
share,” where they jointly
hired a nanny to watch both
their children at the same
time. White-Zollman said
that situation is unique, but
has worked well for them.
Even so, she said, it can
be stressful to find a day
care, and she said she knows
some parents start searching,
and even put their names on
waiting lists, even before a
child is born.
“I know there are a num-
ber of day cares in town that
people are very happy with,”
she said. “It just didn’t work
out for us.”
Desert of options
A study by Oregon State
University’s College of Pub-
lic Health and Human Sci-
ences reflects the same prob-
lems — a statewide lack of
child care, especially for
infants. Entitled “Oregon’s
Child Care Deserts,” the
report, published in Janu-
ary 2019, states that all but
three Oregon counties are
“child care deserts” for chil-
dren under the age of 5, and
all 36 counties are child care
deserts for children ages 0 to
2. The study defines “child
care deserts” as having three
times as many children as
there are available child care
slots.
The study also looks at
the availability of public-
ly-funded child care, which
includes Head Start pro-
grams. Those programs
are available to qualifying
low-income families, and
according to the study, 54
percent of available child
care slots in Umatilla County
are publicly funded. In Mor-
row County, it’s 66 percent.
Part of the challenge with
caring for infants is that the
ratio between infants and
adults must be lower than
that between adults and
older children.
That can be a strain on
providers, both financially
and time-wise.
Mary Shaver, who runs
Busy Bee Preschool and
Childcare out of her home
in Hermiston, said she is
licensed to have up to 16
children at her in-home
day care at a time, but only
accepts children 2 years and
older.
Shaver, who has been pro-
viding child care in Hermis-
ton for about 30 years, said
most of her families find her
through her website, but she
gets a fair amount through
word of mouth, as well.
“I think a lot of day care
providers keep in touch with
each other, and if one doesn’t
have an opening, they see if
another one does,” she said.
Filling the need
Shaver said it’s been
many years since she had to
go through the licensing pro-
cess, but she gets reviewed
twice a year by the state, with
one planned visit and one
unannounced inspection.
Additionally, she said,
providers have to stay up-to-
date to be certified, taking 15
credits worth of classes and
training every year.
For those looking to
become child care provid-
ers, the Childcare Resource
and Referral department is a
starting point.
The agency, which is
under the umbrella of Uma-
tilla-Morrow County Head
Start, provides assistance to
both parents and child care
providers. They connect par-
ents with providers, as well
as resources to help with
costs. They also offer train-
ing and aid for providers as
they start out and serve as
a liaison between providers
and the state, which does the
licensing.
Tobie Sass, the child
development director for
the UMCHS Childcare
Resource and Referral pro-
gram, said the process to
get licensed as a child care
provider isn’t hard, but can
seem daunting.
“We help people start to
finish,” she said. “If you’re
not sure you have safety
equipment, we can provide
it.”
They also loan out books
and toys to help new pro-
viders get started, and write
grants to provide first aid
and safety equipment for
new providers. They conduct
pre-licensing inspections,
and will also teach classes,
such as “Recognizing and
Reporting Child Abuse and
Neglect,” “Techniques and
Tips for Supporting Chil-
dren with ADHD,” and “The
Development of Empathy in
Young Children.” Many of
the courses they teach are
free, or cost $5.
Some of the classes
are more focused on pro-
fessional development, or
learning how to teach chil-
dren new activities. Shaver
said she recently went to a
class that teaches how to use
puppets as a learning tool
and help kids gain language
skills.
Priorities
Some families look to
check several boxes before
sending their child to a pro-
vider. Holt said the most
important question she and
her husband asked was
whether providers required
children to be immunized.
“As someone who works
in the medical field, I’m
very pro-immunization,” she
said. The hospital day care
required kids to be vacci-
nated, as does her son’s new
day care.
She said one of the chal-
lenges with the hospital day
care, other than cost, was
the rate of late charges —
the day care charged $10 per
minute for the first 15 min-
utes a parent was late, and
$20 minute for the next 15.
Shaver said the interview
goes both ways.
“I have to determine if
the child will fit in with the
group we’ve got,” she said.
“And I’m interviewing the
parents. I want to know
they’re good parents, and
are spending time with their
kids.”
Hermiston firefighters climb stairs to fight cancer
By JAYATI RAMAKRISHNAN
STAFF WRITER
Firefighters
are
no
stranger to scaling heights
and putting themselves in
strenuous situations to save
others.
But in March, 10 Herm-
iston firefighters will vol-
untarily climb 69 floors of
stairs, covering 1,356 steps
in a quest to raise money
for leukemia and lymphoma
research.
This is the 10th year that
the Umatilla County Fire
District 1 will have a team at
the SCOTT Firefighter Stair
Climb. The event, which
takes place at Seattle’s
Columbia Center on March
10, draws firefighters from
around the western United
States, as well as a few
international participants,
according to UCFD Battal-
ion Chief Corey Gorham.
Gorham said over the
past nine years UCFD’s
fundraising efforts have
yielded more than $10,000,
all from community dona-
tions. Overall, the event,
which started in 1991, has
raised more than $17 million
for leukemia and lymphoma
research.
Gorham, who was one
of the first team members
to participate 10 years ago,
started because he thought it
would be fun to support the
cause and have something to
train for.
But in 2012, the event’s
purpose became more mean-
ingful to him.
“In 2012, my young-
est daughter was diagnosed
with leukemia,” he said.
His daughter went into
treatment, and is now in
remission — it’s been three
years since her last treat-
ment. But he still likes to
involve his family in the
event, and has had them
come to Seattle for it.
In addition, he said, sev-
eral other team members
have had family members
affected by blood cancers or
other cancers.
“I do it in honor of my
grandpa, who I lost in 2000
to leukemia,” said UCFD
paramedic Danny Hinton.
He is in his fifth year of the
Stair Climb.
The event is popular, and
usually sells out within the
first 20 minutes that sign-
ups are open. The team does
some additional training for
the climb, putting in work
on the stair mill at the gym,
and adding in a few extra
leg days. On the day of the
climb, they suit up in full
firefighter gear, including
coats, boots and air tanks.
Climbers’ times vary
widely. According to last
year’s results, the fastest
finisher completed the stair
climb in 11 minutes and 55
seconds, and the last fin-
ishers took more than two
hours — but the point of the
event is more than climb-
ing the stairs in the shortest
amount of time.
“There are survivors
and honorees that come to
watch, support and cheer on
the climbers,” Gorham said.
Some firefighters who are
cancer survivors also do the
climb.
UCFD hosted a fund-
raiser at Club 24 on Mon-
day, Feb. 18, with a table set
up collecting donations. To
donate, people can also visit
the website www.firefight-
erstairclimb.org, or contact
UCFD at 541-567-8822.
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staff photo by e.J. Harris
Hermiston battalion chief Corey Gorham and his daughter, Maggie, 12, who was diagnosed
with leukemia in 2012. Gorham and a team of Hermiston firefighters will be competing in the
SCOTT Firefighter Stair Climb, a cancer fundraiser, in Seattle, on March 10.
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