SIOUX FALLS, S.D. (KELO) – Lutheran Social Services is ending its services for infants, toddlers and preschool-aged children at Southern Hills, Hilltop and Here4Youth. In a news release, the LSS President and CEO said they are discontinuing the child care services due to financial challenges.
However, the organization has been working with other child care services in the area to find alternative options for families.
The closure of a child care center impacts an entire community of people and the Boys and Girls Clubs of the Sioux Empire is already seeing the effects.
“We had some enrollments overnight already,” Stacy Jones, CEO of the Boys and Girls Clubs of the Sioux Empire, said. “We have already done several tours today and several phone calls today. Some families with multiple kids so they’re looking for a place that can take all of their kids.”
Jones says they are ready to take in some of those kids.
“Looking at our numbers as of this morning, we can take on about fifty more kiddos between our two centers and a variety of different ages,” Jones said. “So really depends on the age, where we can take them and at which center.”
Soon some kids will be transitioning to kindergarten. Jones says that will help open spaces up.
“When that happens we’re transitioning rooms and moving kids up in age,” Jones said. “That allows us a little bit more flexibility right now to be able to help more kids and families.”
It’s not just the daycare families that the Boys and Girls Club can help out with right now. They also have a few staffing opportunities open.
“In early childhood, we have about 10 teacher openings but we also have some openings in our after-school program right now,” Jones said. “So, again, we’re having those conversations with everyone at LSS on how we can support those staff members and as well as those families.”
Jones says they just want to make a difficult time a little easier for everyone.
“This is a challenging time but we really want to try to help as many people as we can,” Jones said. “Unfortunately, this has happened in our community before so we’ve learned how to be really flexible when these things happen in what we can do for families and staff in order to make it work to help as many people as possible,” Jones said.
The last day of the early childcare programs at Lutheran Social Services is August 16th. The organization’s summer and after-school programs for school-aged kids will not be stopping.
