Northern Ontario communities hope to cut daycare wait times with new licensed spaces

The City of Greater Sudbury says it expects long wait times for licensed daycare spaces to improve as it opens more spots over the next two years.

On average, there's a two-year wait to get a toddler into a licensed daycare in the city.

In 2022, Ontario signed onto the Canada-wide Early Learning and Child Care (CWELCC) system, which is expected to lower daycare costs to $10 a day by 2026.

Only licensed daycares that are part of the CWELCC system qualify for the lower fees. That's led to long wait times across the province for those coveted, and cheaper, spaces.

Miranda Mackie, the City of Greater Sudbury's manager of children services, said licensed daycare wait times have already gone down for infants because more parents are choosing to take extended 18-month parental leave.

And now, the city is working with the province to open up to 489 new licensed daycare spaces by the end of 2026.

Ontario's Ministry of Education, which also manages the early childcare system, said in an email to CBC News that it's already approved 257 new licensed daycare spaces for Sudbury.

"Our government will continue to fight for more affordable child care in this province. We are supporting the creation of 86,000 new licensed child care spaces – the single largest expansion of Ontario's child care system," the statement said, referring to plans for all of Ontario.

Mackie said the city has requested approval from the province for an additional 232 spaces, and is waiting for a response.

A key requirement to get spaces is to have enough early childhood educators (ECEs) in the system to care for more children.

Mackie said a lot of people left those jobs during the COVID-19 pandemic, but the workforce is starting to bounce back.

"Happy to say that we have full cohorts who are in that graduating year at Cambrian College and Collège Boréal," she said.

"In addition, we're hopeful that come January, the federal government has committed or announced that there will be additional workforce recruitment efforts and an investment in the workforce, which we hope equates to an increase in the minimum wage floor for our registered early childhood educators."

A relief for parents

Emilia Salhuana, a parent in Sudbury, said more licensed daycare spaces in the city would be welcome news.

Salhuana had to quit a full-time job when she was unable to find a licensed daycare space for her infant son.

She said the cost of a private home daycare would have been almost as much as her salary.

Salhuana said her son got accepted into a licensed daycare when he was 18 months old. That allowed her to go back to work on a part-time basis.

"The cost is around $25 per day if we go for extended hours. If not, it goes down to about $22 which helps a lot," she said.

"It helps that we have a specific amount to budget."

Salhuana said a lack of affordable child care options is especially challenging for families, like hers, that don't have any extended family members nearby.

Around the time her son was accepted into a licensed daycare, Salhuana gave birth to her second child.

She said relatives travelled from as far away as South America to help her with child care during that time.

"They stayed with us, essentially, and we gave them money just as a thank you for their help," Salhuana said. 

More spaces coming to Nipissing

In northern Ontario's Nipissing District, which includes North Bay, daycare wait times aren't as long as they are in Sudbury, but they can still cause issues for some families.

"It has been an issue in our region as well," said Lynn Demoré-Pitre, director of children's services for the District of Nipissing Social Services Administration Board.

"What we've recommended to families is that as soon as they know that they require childcare to put themselves on the wait list."

Demoré-Pitre said the Ministry of Education has approved 182 new licensed childcare spaces in Nipissing District, which are due to open by the end of 2026.