The Denver City Council acted wisely in amending ordinances to remove some technical “Catch-22s” that could have shuttered child-care facilities badly needed by working families.
The zoning law changes championed by Councilwoman Carol Boigon and passed 10-2 by the council June 5 mean that dozens of existing child-care programs are no longer in danger of running afoul of the law.
Boigon notes that the zoning changes are focused on larger facilities rather than home-based child care, which is allowed in residential areas.
The previous, 1950s-vintage zoning technically forbade pre-school, child-care and before- and after-school programs in neighborhoods zoned R-0.
Back in the 1950s, June Cleaver could stay home, care for Wally and the Beaver, and have dinner waiting when Ward came home from work. Child-care facilities weren’t an issue. Fast forward to the first decade of the new millennium and, often as not, families either have two working parents or a single working parent. This necessitates a broad range of child-care services, from infant care to after-school programs for teens.
Also, the council loosened restrictions in R-1 neighborhoods, where pre-school and child-care programs are allowed only in churches and schools.
Boigon explained that the changes permit more flexibility, especially when the use of existing buildings, such as churches or schools, changes. Under the old zoning law, if a church, for example, moved out of a building where a child-care program was offered, that program would have had to shut down.
Also, requirements that child-care programs run in churches be non-profit (while those in schools could be for-profit) were lifted.
“The fact is the city had been allowing child care in places where the code did not expressly allow it, and even in places where the code did not allow it at all,” Boigon explained.
Another change is that such issues as adult-child ratios and outdoor play space requirements set by state law now are covered by licensing rather than zoning.
The zoning changes make a lot of sense and should allow more flexibility providing much needed child-care services to today’s hard-working Denver families.
