Today, the City of Toronto is implementing emergency child care during the current Stay-at-Home order and provincial emergency.
City Council voted yesterday to approve the opening of emergency child care for children of essential workers in Toronto. On April 6, Toronto Public Health (TPH) issued a Section 22 order under the Health Protection and Promotion Act that moved all Toronto schools to online and/or remote learning effective April 7. As part of this order, licensed child care programs, including licensed home child care, will not be permitted to offer care to school-aged children, with the exception of emergency child care for those who qualify.
Licensed child care programs will continue for younger children, which includes infants, toddlers, and preschoolers. This includes child care programs that are co-located in a school.
Beginning the week of April 12, emergency child care services will be available at no cost to eligible families who are not able to accommodate care at home for their school-aged children. The safest option for families is to have children remain at home, if possible.
Four City-operated Toronto Early Learning & Child Care Centre (TELCCCS) locations will provide emergency child care during this period: Chester Le, O’Connor Satellite, Shoreham and Taylor Creek. Toronto Home Child Care (THCC) will also provide child care for younger children and school-aged children of essential workers. Toronto Children’s Services will work closely with licensed child care providers and local school boards to identify interest and prepare for the opening of additional community emergency child care locations for school-aged children beginning the week of April 12.
Eligible families may apply directly to the emergency child care provider of their choice.
For details on eligibility, how to apply for emergency child care and for the list of approved emergency child care providers, visit https://www.toronto.ca/home/covid-19/covid-19-latest-city-of-toronto-news/affected-city-services/covid-19-emergency-child-care-for-essential-workers/
Quote:
“We are doing everything we can to help people get through this pandemic. Council has taken immediate action to approve the funding for emergency child care and our staff are working quickly to make emergency child care available to essential workers. We rely on these every day heroes to fight COVID-19 and keep things running during this third wave of the pandemic, and it is important that they know that they can rely on us.”
– Toronto Mayor John Tory
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