KANSAS CITY, Mo. — The YMCA of Greater Kansas City is offering child care to all essential personnel during the coronavirus pandemic, including health care workers, first responders and grocery store employees.
Children who are in kindergarten to sixth grade are eligible for the program, at either the Olathe or Kansas City locations.
"Over the last two weeks we’ve had to close our YMCA facilities and not be able to provide traditional services,” President and CEO John Mikos said. “So our organization has begun to pivot and look at our facilities in different ways,"
The YMCA teamed up with Olathe Health to provide the child care at the Olathe Family YMCA. The health care system is paying all of the expenses for its associates for the next 90 days.
Greg Westbrook, chief human resources officer at Olathe Health, said they wanted to take some of the pressure off of the employees.
"We’re going to need more and more of their time picking up extra shifts, covering other people who might be out and we wanted them not to worry about child care," Westbrook said.
Health Forward Foundation, according to Mikos, has donated funds allowing free child care for health care workers at Truman Medical, Swope Health Services and Samuel U. Rodgers Health Center.
To learn more about the child care services, visit the YMCA's website.
