Colorado Springs mom struggling to find child care amid Pikes Peak College closing child care

COLORADO SPRINGS, Colo. (KRDO) -- Pikes Peak State College's Rampart campus in north Colorado Springs has closed its child development center, leaving a dozen students searching for child care services. Pikes Peak's Centennial campus in southwest Colorado Springs is now taking on caring for more children; however, it's currently at capacity and is a sizable drive for parents on the north side.

One mom, Meredith Bates, is a nurse at Pikes Peak State College. Her two children would attend the Rampart campuses child care services until she was told in April that the location would be closing its doors.

"I got an email at the end of April that they were closing that campuses down. The end of the semester was May 6th. It's been extremely hard," Bates said. "Hard enough that I won't take classes next semester because you can't with kids."

Bates said she was willing to make the half-hour drive to the Centennial campus and back each day but was told that the non-profit taking over the campus would not support them.

When 13 Investigates reached out to the college for answers on why the Rampart campus was closed, we were told it's largely a staffing issue.

"We recognize the need for child care. This is something that is not going away. The child care crisis is getting worse. The pay for the folks is not always what it should be and that is one of the things that we were kind of shoved up against. It was a tough thing for us to do," Executive Director for Media Communications Warren Epstein said.

13 Investigates learned that the Centennial campuses child development center will now be run by a local non-profit, Community Partnership for Child Development (CPCD).

According to the president of CPCD Noreen Landis-Tyson, they agreed to take over the Centennial campus because of its long-term economic outlook. They declined to run the Rampart campus, effectively closing its doors.

Landis-Tyson said the Centennial campus has increased its capacity from 13 to 36 children. Between the two campuses, Pikes Peak College was servicing 25 children prior to the closure.

She said many of the 36 children, 16 infants, and 20 preschoolers, were previously receiving services from them and wanted to return. She said nearly all are children with parents who attend Pikes Peak College.

However, Bates told 13 Investigates that she is at a loss for why Pikes Peak College decided to abandon the Rampart campuses child development center and the families along with it.

"My kids had a relationship with those teachers and those teachers were let go so that's really hard," Bates said. "To go with the short notice and the lack of support from the school has been really difficult."

Bates said the staffing excuse is not a valid one. During COVID, she claims they let go of dozens of employees with no desire to hire them back when the need increased.

"Both of the day cares were funded by student fees. We pay fees to keep these day cares funded. The fact that they let go of 47 people by closing them because of a staffing shortage, they actually had the college on a hiring freeze," Bates said.

Epstein told 13 Investigates that the parents and staff were given "a few weeks notice" and said that there is a current wait list for families looking to transfer their children from the Rampart campus to the Centennial campus. However, he referred us more to CPCD for more information.

"The bottom line is we are serving more than we ever have before. It's not like the service has been totally cut off," Epstein said. "I understand that individual families may be facing specific problems, but overall we are really happy with the way this transition is going."

Pikes Peak State College did not give an exact reason for closing the campus. However, Landis-Tyson with CPCD said the need wasn't there because the Rampart campus is a more "affluent" area.

Bates said the need is absolutely there. She said she called 12 separate daycares in her area on Friday and all of them were full and could not provide her with care. She says she her financial aid provided her an opportunity to send her children to Pikes Peaks child development center. However, now she says families are having to pay CPCD $286 a week for their services.

She expressed her frustration with the child care being funded by students, many of whom are now searching elsewhere for care with little support from the college.

CPCD told 13 Investigates they want to work with families to give them the child care they need, but until they have more staff available their options are limited.

Bates said if she doesn't get the support she needs she will have to drop out of her fall semester classes because, without a place for her children to go, she is not able to attend college full-time.

"They had enabled me to accomplish my educational goals for a long time until now which it felt like a hard stop. Just like "we're done," Bates said.