San Diego

The City Council Rules Committee on Monday ordered the city manager’s office to conduct a 90-day study to determine if the city, in conjunction with the private sector, could spur development of child-care facilities in the downtown area. In addition, the manager was directed to investigate the feasibility of establishing a day-care center downtown for City of San Diego employees.

Councilwoman Gloria McColl has been leading the drive to open day-care facilities downtown. Currently, McColl said, downtown has only one small, privately owned, day-care center.

Assistant City Manager John Lockwood said the city has been attempting to promote day-care facilities downtown for 10 years, without success.

During the last decade, there have been four previous city studies on the day-care issue. In each of those studies, Lockwood said, “the need for (downtown day-care centers) was reconfirmed, but the facilities were not available.”

McColl had proposed that industrial development bonds be used to fund a downtown day-care center, but Lockwood said that would “not be feasible.” Lockwood said it is not economically sound to offer bonds for projects of less than $5 million “due to high fixed costs” involved. It would be more realistic for the city to allocate funds for day care on a lease-back arrangement, Lockwood said.

According to Lockwood, city funding of day-care facilities is limited to centers in Southeast San Diego and Ocean Beach, areas a previous study determined had the most acute need of day-care.