The city of Airway Heights is offering two city-owned properties for sale to generate funds for its public safety campus—a move that will accelerate the city's plans for a new $1.5 million child care facility on the West Plains, says Airway Heights city manager Albert Tripp.

"This area here is a child care desert," Tripp says.

Before the child care center can begin operating, however, the city's fire and police departments and City Hall services must relocate to the $9.3 million Airway Heights public safety campus, located at 1149 S. Garfield Road, which is expected to occur in 2025, as previously reported in the Journal.

Once City Hall relocates to the Garfield site, the 8,700-square-foot Airway Heights Community Center Building, at 13120 W. 13th, will become available for child care use.

"Our City Council made a strategic decision to try to fuel phase two to happen sooner rather than later so that courts can relocate at the new building and child care can move into this building even faster," says Tripp. "If we can divest ourselves of this existing building and make it available for child care, (the city could) kill two birds with one stone."

Preliminary design plans show that the first floor of the 38-year-old building will have three preschool classrooms ranging from 800 to 900 square feet in size, a 675-square-foot toddler room, a 660-square-foot infant room, multiple restrooms, storage areas, a kitchen, and an office space.

A 1,300-square-foot play area, a break room, and a second office are planned on the second floor. The community center building also will have an updated fire suppression system and modifications to an elevator to meet updated building codes, Tripp says.

Exterior plans involve cosmetic updates and restructuring the parking into a more accessible area for adults to drop children off and pick them up.

Design plans for the child care center were created by NAC Architecture, of Spokane, based on a Washington state Department of Commerce needs assessment and feasibility study that declared the city of Airway Heights a child care desert nearly three years ago, explains Tripp.

"It reaffirmed the experiences we were having, which was that child care is in tremendous need on the West Plains," he says.

The facility is expected to offer care for 75 to 100 children, says Tripp. 

City of Airway Heights officials also are working to secure funds through state and federal grants, the sale of the 1,700-square-foot Building and Planning department facility at 13414 W. Sunset Highway, and the sale of the 4,800-square-foot fire station currently in use, at 1208 S. Lundstrom, in addition to other resources, he says. 

Tripp declines to disclose the name of the child care provider until phase two renovations draw near for the Garfield property. 

The child care operator was selected for the attention and care of children, competitive wages for teachers, and the ability and willingness, "to do more with less," says Tripp. 

"Part of the challenge with child care is the inability to be able to make it pencil from a financial standpoint as a business model due to the reimbursement rates they actually receive," he says. “The partner we're working with has a model wherein they can come alongside and provide child care at no cost for a year’s time, and under that particular model, the city would retain ownership of the building and just make it available for that use."