BOARD URGES MINOR CHANGES IN DAY CARE

The Cape Girardeau Planning and Zoning Commission Wednesday recommended only minor changes in city laws that regulate day care homes.

The commission's review of day care regulations was prompted by a recent neighborhood dispute over a day care home on Delwin Street.

The city council Monday denied a request for a special use permit for a day care home for 10 children while the operator lived elsewhere.

City zoning regulations require that the operators of such facilities live at the home and restrict to six the total number of children.

But new state day care regulations allow operators of day care home to make their residence at another home. The state also grants licenses to day care home operators for up to 10 children.

Because of the discrepancy, the council asked the Planning and Zoning Commission to examine the matter and determine if city zoning changes were warranted.

But the only change recommended Wednesday by the commission was that a non-resident be allowed at the day care homes during operational hours in case of some type of emergency that forced the operator to leave.

Deanna Long, the state's day care licensing supervisor for Southeast Missouri, said the state requires that an "adult assistant" be available to licensed day care providers.

Commissioners said they were opposed to allowing more than six children in day care homes in residential areas. They also maintained that the day care provider must live in the home.

Commissioner Tom Holshouser said, "My conception of the whole thing is that six is just like a large family, but when you get up to 10, it's a commercial venture.

"I don't think we really need that sort of thing in a residential neighborhood."

Long said that although the state licenses day care home providers for up to 10 children, few of the facilities in Cape Girardeau have that many. "Most people actually restrict themselves," she said.

But Long said she didn't think there was much difference between a day care home with six or 10 children.

Commissioner Dennis Vollink said the issue before the Planning and Zoning Commission has little to do with how the day care homes are operated.

"The question for us comes down to, if you have 10 children in a house instead of six, what effect does that have on traffic and parking in the neighborhood," Vollink said.

But Long said most of the day care home traffic is staggered with parents arriving at different times.

"I think a lot of times, a day care home with 10 children will have less traffic than a regular home with three teenagers," she said.

Long said the demand for day care in Cape Girardeau is great. She said that 56 percent of young women with children work outside the home, yet there are only enough licensed providers to care for a fifth of the children.

"That means most of those children are going somewhere else," she said. "I would like to regulate where those kids are going."

She said there are about 10,000 children under the age of 11 in Cape Girardeau, but only three new day care homes were licensed last year to take care of a total of 30 children.

Long indicated that if zoning laws were changed to allow 10 children in day care homes, it would open the door for more children to attend licensed facilities.

But Chairman Charles Haubold said the commission too often has been criticized in the past for "spot zoning" in residential areas. He said allowing day care homes throughout the city to go from six to 10 children could lead to further neighborhood disputes like the one on Delwin.

"We have to be very, very careful on what we do," Haubold said. "Once you set a precedent, you have to live by it.

"None of us has been against expanding it from six to 10 in the right location, with the right zoning. We just don't want to open it up for everybody."

Holshouser added, "We're not denying more than six, we're just denying it in residential areas."