THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: Tuesday, September 12, 1995 TAG: 9509120029
SECTION: DAILY BREAK PAGE: E1 EDITION: FINAL
SOURCE: BY ELIZABETH SIMPSON, STAFF WRITER
LENGTH: Long : 235 lines
IT'S 5 p.m., THE time most working parents are shuttling their children from day care to home.
But Jessica Ifill is just arriving at The 'Sitter center on Lynnhaven Road in Virginia Beach. This flourescent-lighted storefront will be the 6-year-old's second day care of the day, her second round of friends, her second shift of play time.
``I explain to her that I have to work,'' says her mother, Marcia Samuels, who works at Burger King during the day and Montgomery Ward at night. ``Some day she'll understand.''
The parents dropping off their children at The 'Sitter day-care center during the afternoon don't work the usual 8-to-5 shifts. They're mall workers who don't close shop until after 9 p.m. Navy enlistees who pull the evening shift. Grocery-store cashiers who are still ringing up sales when most workers have gone home for the day.
They are part of a growing number of people working long, nonstandard or erratic hours. According to a government report released earlier this year, one in five full-time American workers - 14.3 million - worked nonstandard hours in 1991. More than one-third of those workers were mothers.
The country's movement to a round-the-clock economy, with businesses stretching hours of operation to serve working parents, is fueling those numbers. And welfare reform is supposed to push the numbers ever higher, as more people enter the work force.
That leaves parents with a problem: finding child care to match their hours. The number of day-care providers who will keep children beyond the usual 6 a.m.-to-6 p.m. hours has not kept pace with demand.
A referral service coordinated by the Norfolk-based Planning Council shows eight centers out of about 300 listed in South Hampton Roads offer hours after 6:30 p.m., and 100 out of about 800 home day-care providers on the list do. Only one center - The Children's Workshop in Norfolk - stays open around the clock.
``The need is definitely there,'' said Dana Fink, who coordinates the referral service for The Planning Council. ``Some parents put together a patchwork kind of care. They may have their child go to after-school care, then go home with a friend.''
Some parents enlist neighbors or relatives to keep their children, and some parents work opposite shifts to make sure child-care needs are covered. Others look to the handful of centers in the area that provide extended hours.
The 'Sitter is one of those centers. Started as a drop-in babysitting service, the center expanded its services several years ago to include regular day care.
The center's night hours - it's open until midnight every night and until 2:30 a.m. on Fridays and Saturdays - make it attractive to parents who work late shifts.
``People don't always have 9-to-5, Monday-through-Friday schedules anymore,'' said owner Ginny Kwedar. ``And there's usually no grandmas next door who can keep the children like they used to.''
About 5:45 p.m. one recent Monday, a time when many families are sitting down to dinner, Virginia Beach resident Sheila Ristow drops off her 4-year-old daughter, Heather, at the center.
This is Heather's second stint at The 'Sitter for the day. She was here while Sheila worked a 10 a.m.-to-3 p.m. shift as a cashier at Food Lion. Sheila took Heather home for supper and a few one-on-one hours, and now has brought her back to The 'Sitter again.
She made dozens of phone calls trying to find a day-care provider who took children outside the usual 6 a.m.-to-6 p.m. hours. ``No one seems to do day care weekends or evenings. I needed both.''
Finally she found The 'Sitter.
This particular Monday Heather joins a group of a dozen children spending the evening.
As afternoon rush hour lessens outside, the children sit on the floor to sing songs before dinner. ``If you're hungry and you know it, sit real still.
The children then sit down on benches at a long table to eat ham, applesauce and peas. ``I want my mommy,'' says 2-year-old Devon Olson. After supper the children go outside to play for an hour, then come back inside to watch ``Dumbo.'' By now the windows are black with darkness, and the number of children has dwindled to nine.
It's 9 p.m., the time most children are settling into their own beds, listening to bedtime stories and cuddling with parents. While staff member Patricia Tilton sets up cots, the children line up for a bathroom break. Devon still wants his mother. He plops down on his cot and cries.
Kwedar gathers him in her arms and soothes him, at the same time reaching out to a cot to rock another child to sleep. Lyne-Lyne Bobias is still singing Jingle Bells.
Three children leave. Three cots are dismantled and put away. Lyne-Lyne, a ball of energy a few minutes earlier, is the first to fall asleep.
The other children drop off one by one to the sound of vacuuming, a baby crying and a song on the radio:
``This is for all the lonely people, thinking that life has passed them by.
It was in 1993 that employees of the Women's Bureau of the U.S. Labor Department first heard stories that led them to study the problem of night-time day care.
Workers at a round-the-clock food-processing plant in Idaho were leaving sleeping children in cars in the parking lot while they worked night shifts. ``These were not bad parents, but parents with bad options,'' said Karen Nussbaum, director of the Women's Bureau.
The bureau's study found that not only were there huge numbers of people struggling with finding night-time care, but also that the problem was likely to grow.
The report the bureau produced, ``Care Around the Clock,'' also tracked down communities that had found solutions to the problem.
In some cases, employers were the key. For instance, the Toyota Motor Manufacturing plant in Georgetown, Ky., opened an on-site 24-hour child-care center for employees.
In other communities, groups of people joined forces. In San Francisco, for instance, an organization of unions, employers, governments and community groups established a 24-hour center for employees of the San Francisco International Airport.
The Women's Bureau is now challenging parents, governments and companies to find solutions in their own communities.
``Right now we're operating in an economy that depends on working 24 hours a day and requires and expects families to have both parents working,'' Nussbaum said. ``Just as roads were built and bus systems were created for workers, day-care is a basic element that's needed in the infrastructure.''
If welfare reform works as intended and brings more people into the work force, the problem of night-time day care will only get worse. ``Unfortunately the kind of jobs that are available for unskilled workers are most often low wage and very likely second or third shift,'' Nussbaum said.
The result is likely to be more latch-key children, unless communities come up with solutions for working parents struggling to find child care.
Locally, many child advocates see day care in which children are cared for in the providers' homes as a critical piece of the overnight-care solution. ``Home day-care providers can be much more flexible than centers,'' Fink said. They can adjust their hours of operation more easily to fit parents' needs and also provide a setting that's more like a child's home, which can be important to children at night.
Norfolk resident Pam Warner first started her day-care business out of her home 10 years ago. She was one of those rare providers who didn't flinch when a parent said he worked nights or weekends.
A little over a year ago, she decided to open a 24-hour center, The Children's Workshop. It's now the only around-the-clock center in South Hampton Roads.
``I had one mother who cried when she heard I could keep her children at night,'' said Warner, a single mother well-aware of the pressures of working parents. ``People are so appreciative they just about kiss your feet.''
It's now 9:30 p.m., and parents, one by one, come tapping at the window of The 'Sitter, where the doors were locked when darkness fell.
Tilton lets in Brenda Hoberg, and the mother hurries over to her 6-month-old daughter's crib-away-from-home. Pink-clad Elizabeth Ann is fast asleep. Hoberg carefully picks her up and lands her tiny head on her shoulder. Hoberg works at Animal Jungle pet store and sometimes doesn't get off until midnight.
Before Hoberg is out the door, Beth Wright, Lyne-Lyne's mother, arrives from her job as a sales associate at a jewelry store.
``Lyne-Lyne,'' she says, gently jostling her daughter's elbow. Lyne-Lyne, her long black hair spiraling across the sheet, doesn't budge. ``Lyne-Lyne,'' Wright tries again.
Still, nothing. Finally a little firmer. ``Lyne-Lyne!'' The little girl slowly gets up, her hair tousled, and looks around sleepily.
``Are you sleepy?'' Wright asks her. Lyne-Lyne shakes her head no.
Next comes Marcia Samuels, finished with her night shift at Montgomery Ward. Jessica, too, is loath to wake. Finally one of the staff members picks her up and loops her arms around Samuels, who puts her arms around the girl and pulls her along.
Leaving the well-lighted storefront, Samuels tells the staff, ``See you tomorrow.'' ILLUSTRATION: [Color Photos]
BETH BERGMAN/Staff photos
TOP: the center at 10:30 p.m., still open for business.
ABOVE: Heather Ristow lays her head down during a movie hour at the
center. At left is Jessica Ifill, 6.
RIGHT: Brenda Hoberg embraces her daughter, Elizabeth Ann, 6 months,
trying hard not to wake her. It was 10 p.m.
Pooh Bear watches over Devon Olson, 2, on his cot with his security
blanket. It was about 8:30 p.m., when all of the children were put
to bed.
JUST THE FACTS
Nearly one in five full-time workers in the United States - 14.3
million - worked nonstandard hours in 1991.
The long-term trend toward a service-based economy, with stores,
restaurants and even banks open more evenings and weekends, means
odder working hours for many parents.
In 1991, 5 million of the full-time workers with nonstandard
hours were women.
In 1990, 7.2 million mothers with 11.7 million children under 15
worked full or part-time during non-standard hours.
SOLUTIONS:
1. Employer designs a child-care program to fit the company's
work schedule:
Toyota Motor Manufacturing of Georgetown, Ky., has opened an ``on
site'' 24-hour child-care center licensed for 230 children ages 6
weeks to 13 years.
The Massachusetts Bay Transportation Authority contracts with 32
licensed child-care centers to meet employees' child-care needs, and
offers tuition subsidies.
2. A group of employers come together on an industry or
geographic basis to share knowledge, pool resources and conduct
joint child-care projects:
Close to Home, a consortium of employers from Phoenix, recruits
and trains child-care providers to accommodate nonstandard
schedules.
A group of employers from the hotel industry in Atlanta formed
Central Atlanta Hospitality Childcare to address the child care
difficulties of employees of the hotel and motel industry. They are
developing the Children's Inn, which will provide family services
and an early learning center for children of low-income hotel
workers.
3. A variety of people in the community - employers, parents,
providers, unions, resource organizations, local governments - join
together to identify child care needs and solutions, pool resources
and share skills and expertise:
Palcare is a nonprofit organization formed by unions, employers,
local governments and community groups to establish a 24-hour,
seven-day-a-week child-care center for employees at the San
Francisco International Airport and surrounding communities.
Source: ``Care Around the Clock'' report, U.S. Department of
Labor Women's Bureau. For a copy of the report call (800) 827-5335.
HELP IN a CHILD-CARE SEARCH:
The Planning Council offers a resource and referral service, and
also has brochures on finding quality day care: 627-3993
The Virginia Department of Social Services can tell you if a
provider is licensed or not, and can tell you whether licensed
day-care providers have any valid complaints registered against
them. Hand-outs on finding quality day-care are also available.
473-2100
BETH BERGMAN
Staff
Melissa Hallam, 5, is fast asleep at left. At right is 6-month-old
Elizabeth Ann Hoberg.
KEYWORDS: CHILD CARE by CNB