Investment will expand access to child care spaces at ÉÉC Sainte-Marguerite-Bourgeoys
The Ontario government is investing $500,000 to create 24 child care spaces at École élémentaire catholique Sainte-Marguerite-Bourgeoys to help working families in Brantford.
This investment, announced by Will Bouma, MPP for Brantford-Brant, is part of the Ford Government’s commitment to supporting affordable and accessible child care in communities across the province.
Once complete, the project will provide 1 preschool room through the province’s Early Years Capital Program.
The expansion at ÉÉC Sainte-Marguerite-Bourgeoys in Conseil scolaire catholique MonAvenir is part of a provincewide investment of more than $600 million to support school and child care spaces that were recently announced by Stephen Lecce, Minister of Education. The overall investment will support 78 school and child care related projects. As part of this investment, the province dedicated more than $95 million to create more than 3,000 new child care spaces through renovations and additions at 55 child care centres across Ontario. The investment will provide families with more options for their children.
Across Ontario, the province is supporting the creation of 40 infant rooms (400 new spaces), 59 toddler rooms (885 new spaces), 71 preschool rooms (1,704 new spaces), and seven family age group rooms (105 new spaces).
The announcement supports Ontario’s child care plan which focuses on making child care more affordable, providing more choice and availability for families, reducing red tape and administrative burden, improving quality, and effectively delivering high standards of care.
“After years of neglect under the previous government, we are stepping up to support families by investing in affordable and accessible child care that meets their needs,” said Minister Lecce. “These investments are key to our economic recovery and further evidence of how our government continues to lead the way when it comes to investing in child care.”
“I am pleased to be part of a government that is seeing a thriving and quality publicly-funded French Catholic education system in Ontario,” said Brantford-Brant MPP Will Bouma. “These new child-care spaces that our government is funding will help the hard-working families at the École élémentaire catholique Sainte-Marguerite-Bourgeoys in Brantford will have a more balanced work-school-home life”.
As part of this plan to make child care affordable, safe and accessible, Ontario has committed up to $1 billion to create up to 30,000 new child care spaces over five years. To date, over 23,000 new spaces have been approved and builds upon Ontario’s existing and well-established child care infrastructure giving families more choices and flexibility.
“The Conseil scolaire catholique MonAvenir would like to thank the Ministry of Education for this funding,” said Chair of the Board of Conseil scolaire catholique Mon Avenir, Geneviève Grenier. “It will allow us to expand the space reserved for Le Ballon rouge daycare at École élémentaire catholique Sainte-Marguerite-Bourgeoys. The announcement of this funding for the addition of 24 preschool spaces is great news for francophone families in the Brantford area. We are pleased that the Ontario government has recognized the growing needs of the francophone population and we look forward to beginning the construction project.”
In addition, to support parents with the cost of child care and help them re-enter the workforce, Ontario is providing a 20 per cent enhancement of the Childcare Access and Relief from Expenses (CARE) tax credit for 2021. This will increase support from $1,250 to $1,500 per family, on average, providing about $75 million in additional support for the 2021 child care expenses of over 300,000 families.
The Ontario government has allocated more than $600 million to support ventilation improvements in schools across Ontario as part of its plans for a safer return to school. The CSC MonAvenir has benefited from an investment of $1.4 million for ventilation improvements and has over 490 HEPA filter units in place.
ÉÉC Sainte-Marguerite-Bourgeoys is located at 60 Clench Avenue in Brantford.
