Saratoga News

Photograph by Edmund Lee

Dory Albert recently used the Mother's Day Out program at Saratoga Federated Church. Her children are (from left) Miles, 3 months old, Colin, 21/2 years old and Isabelle, 41/2.

Mother's Day Out closing due to staffing shortage at church

By Sarah Lombardo

A staff shortage at the Saratoga Federated Church could see a lot of local moms attending appointments, doing the shopping or visiting friends with kids in tow.

The sudden retirement of a staffer in the church's Children's Ministries has led church officials to close its Mother's Day Out program, which provides part-time, pay-as-you-stay child care for local parents. The program's last day is scheduled for Thursday, Aug. 27.

Steve Beveridge, Elder of Children's Ministries at the church, said the shortage brought up a number of safety concerns with church officials. At normal staffing levels, the Mother's Day Out staffer has back-up personnel on which to rely in case something happens. With the reduced staff, that back-up just isn't there, Beveridge said.

"We have to think of safety for the children first," Beveridge said.

The news was a disappointment to local parents who have come to count on it over the past eight years for a few precious hours of child care a week.

"It's been a great thing for the women because women who work and also women who don't work use it," Saratogan Dory Albert said. "It's wonderful."

The Mother's Day Out program is not a day care, but instead is a short-term child-care service on Tuesdays and Thursdays from 9 a.m. to 1 p.m.--just long enough for parents to run some errands, have a quiet lunch with friends or sneak in some Christmas shopping away from kids' watchful eyes. Beveridge said the program serves about 30 children per day on average.

"The idea was to create a safe, loving environment with a Christian influence in which there'd be a few hours that parents could schedule ahead of time and have available to them," Beveridge said.

"It's not a lot, but it's enough that it's helpful," Albert said. "It's a great facility."

Because the problem is related to staffing, Beveridge stressed, Mother's Day Out could be reinstated when the church is back to full staff again.

"We believe in the program," Beveridge said. "This is only temporary."

And that's good news to not only parents but to to Marilyn McKevitt, who proposed the program eight years ago and currently works at the church.

"It has become one of the most wonderful programs," she said. "We're a family there for the moms. They need more of these."

Anyone interested in becoming a Children's Ministries staffer can call Elaine Wade at the Saratoga Federated Church at 867-3455 for more information.

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