Thanks to an anonymous benefactor, area childcare centers and low-income parents have a helping hand when it comes to caring for children.
The Angel Foundation began two years ago and has been making an impact on children and families ever since. Whether helping low-income parents defray the costs of daycare, which can run into hundreds of dollars a month, or helping centers out with equipment, the Angel Foundation cares for the community's youngest members.
"We're all out there to help people and have a common goal: take care of their kids," said Karin Cooney, director of the Angel Foundation. "What we do is just barely filling a gap, we give almost half of our operating budget to area families."
"In this area, the cost of childcare versus income is very high," she added.
The Angel Foundation currently helps 17 families pay for daycare and has the budget to assist eight more. These working families often fall between the cracks of daycare assistance from the state's Department of Human Services, oftentimes by just a few dollars. In other cases, a promotion, while good news, sometimes disqualifies a family for the assistance and may actually cost the family money as daycare costs jump.
"A promotion can send them backwards," Cooney said, noting that the state agency has tightened income requirements in recent years.
One of the more notable success is the partnership the foundation helped broker between St. Michael's Lutheran Church and the Father Fred Foundation to open the Angel Care center last April.
While the Angel Foundation was forming, board members connected with the Rev. Tim Brandt of the St. Michael's Lutheran Church. Already operating a partial-day preschool, that church was looking to expand its services to more a full-time basis serving more children. A partnership formed: the Father Fred Foundation purchased the building next to its Hastings Street facility, the Angel Foundation helped pay for a complete retrofit of the former commercial facility and St. Michael's staffed the facility.
"They saw the need because they had so many people inquiring about more services," noted Cooney of the St. Michael's Lutheran Church, which went from serving ten children to being licensed to serve 60 children, 40 at a time.
The Angel Foundation now works with daycare facilities in other churches, including Noah's Ark Daycare and Bright Beginnings, and is looking to connect with others. Fulfilling the benefactor's requirement, the foundation only aids either daycare centers that have a faith-based curriculum or parents whose children attend one of these centers.
Kitty Schechter, director of Angel Care, said four of her families receive help from the Angel Foundation to pay fees. The facility has 60 children enrolled ages three months through five years old and is licensed up to six, a huge jump in service thanks in part to the Angel Foundation with equipment purchases at the new location.
She works to steer families she believes would qualify to the Angel Foundation for help.
"I know we could help some more, but many say, 'Save it for someone who really needs it,'" said Schechter.
Educating the public and low-income parents is key to getting them help from the Angel Foundation. While the foundation offers assistance only to children enrolled at approved, faith-based daycare centers, there are not any religious or church requirements for a family to receive a scholarship.
"People are quite confused because they think it's our scholarship or because it's with Father Fred, they tend to think it's free daycare or drop-in daycare," Schechter said. "Or they ask if they have to be a certain religion or what church do they have to go to."
For more information about the Angel Foundation, contact Cooney at 649-0995 or see their website at www.angelfoundationgt.org.