Petersburg’s Hospital Board heard public testimony at its meeting on September 28th about its trial childcare program.
Last year, Petersburg Medical Center partnered with Kinder Skog, a local nature-based childcare provider, to host after-school youth programming. As the pilot programming wraps up its first year, it’s scheduled to go under review by the Hospital Board.
The idea for the partnership arose from the results of the childcare needs assessment funded by the Petersburg Community Foundation. The survey underscored systemic industry challenges to childcare options for working parents in the community.
At the start of last week’s hospital board meeting, four community members gave impassioned testimony for PMC’s youth programming. Molly Taiber was one of them. She said all Petersburg residents should be concerned with childcare availability — whether they have children or not.
“This makes a difference in how businesses run in our community,” said Taiber. “This need dictates if our coworkers, neighbors and relatives can come to work or keep their jobs. The quality of staff, the activity level, and leadership skills that are learned daily with this program is invaluable to me as a parent and to us as community members.”
The final public testimony of the night came from Katie Holmlund, PMC’s Youth Program Coordinator. She’s stewarded Kinder Skog for several years, and she said it’s been a long journey.
“It’s a program that I have fully invested myself in because our kids are worth it,” said Holmlund. “Under PMC, not only has the program grown substantially in terms of capacity, it has allowed me the support that I needed, in order to become an advocate at the state level.”
Holmlund said PMC is now viewed across the state as a leader in childcare programming. She, alongside medical center CEO Phil Hofstetter, testified to the state Childcare Task Force about industry barriers on September 20th.
Hofstetter also attended the annual Alaska Hospital and Healthcare Association conference last month, where attendees showered PMC’s youth programming with praise. In his report to the board, he said representatives from other hospitals were approaching him with questions about how to replicate PMC’s success.
“One of the hospitals actually came up to us and said: ‘How can I get this going?’ We want to do the same thing,'” said Hofstetter. “[We got] really strong compliments on that program.”
At the next Hospital Board meeting on October 26th, Holmlund will give a debrief on the past year of the trial childcare programming. Then the Hospital Board will decide whether or not it will continue.
