From the left, Edwina “Eddie” Benites, Kelly Chaney, Wayne Clark and Nickie Haines participate in a panel discussion on child care in Jefferson County. Hans Fogle, far right, director of university communications at Shepherd University, moderated the discussion. Ainsley Hall

SHEPEHRDSTOWN — On Wednesday evening, the Stubblefield Institute for Civil Political Communications, located at Shepherd University, hosted a panel entitled “A 360 View of Childcare in Jefferson County,” where guests talked about the need for child care.

Guests gathered at the Robert C. Byrd Center auditorium to learn more about the issue and hear from leaders in the community.

The panel included Edwina “Eddie” Benites, executive director of the Jefferson County Development Authority (JCDA) and Jefferson County administrator; Kelly Chaney, imaging services manager at WVU Medicine Jefferson Medical Center; Delegate Wayne Clark, from the 99th District; and Nickie Haines, director of Children’s Tree House at the National Conservation Training Center.

Benites shared statics that show that there is a need for child care in Jefferson County. In 2023, the JCDA did a study to find the average wait time between seeking care and finding care in Jefferson County. It found that it takes 13.3 months to find care, while in Berkeley County, it only takes six months, and in Fredrick County, it takes three months.

“We found that the most significant issue for this is capacity,” Benites said. “We have about half of the capacity per resident of child care than Fredrick County does. So, if we can find a way to double our capacity, we will be able to significantly reduce that wait time.”

Clark shared a few things that are being worked on at the state level to solve this issue. He hopes to make changes but said many representatives in the state do not believe child care is a state issue. To improve the employment rate, Clark believes they need to fix this problem and allow more people to join the workforce.

Haines shared that she recently had a conversation with another day care director, who has an empty room, because they can’t find the staff to run the class. Meanwhile, Haines has a long wait list without any openings until 2025. She shared that one of the reasons is because day cares can’t offer their staff the salary they deserve.

“Day care staff needs the same qualifications as a teacher, but we can barely pay them minimum wage,” Haines said. “It’s just not working. I think day cares should be funded by the state like the schools.”

Some of the suggested solutions to this issue included creating more openings for child care. Benites talked about her plans to try opening a YMCA in Jefferson County, which is one of the largest providers of child care in the country.

Benites and her team are also trying to increase day care capacity by expanding two centers, creating 80 slots, and by attracting new day care providers, creating 180 slots. However, Haines reminded the room that unless they find staff to support these centers and pay them appropriately, they won’t be able to fix the problem.

One suggestion to create more day care employees was to have a similar program to the MedEd program, which trains high school students and prepares them for the medical field under the promise that they will work locally for a period of time. All the panelists agreed that this would be a great idea to create more incentives for students.