Several parents who have children at the Happyface childcare location in Winchester were unsure of who to contact last week to express their concerns about broken air conditioning at the location. The newly constructed addition to Winchester Public School has air conditioning – unlike the rest of the building – but it stopped working early last week.
One parent – Michael Lombardi – was particularly frustrated. He told the Times that on one of the days last week, the indoor temperature was recorded at 29 degrees Celsius. He feels that this is a serious issue, calling it a “health and welfare crisis” for the infants, toddlers, and preschoolers who receive childcare at the location.
But to whom can parents turn? The legislation that governs childcare in Ontario does not require childcare centres to be air conditioned. In fact, although centres are legally required to be kept at a minimum indoor temperature of 20 degrees Celsius, there is no specified maximum temperature. Other childcare sites and public schools – including the rest of the Winchester Public School building – routinely operate without A/C, much to the dismay of children, staff, and parents alike. Michael asserts that with the younger age group being served at Happyface, common sense must prevail.
Parents report that an email sent last week identified ways that staff are attempting to remedy the situation, though the parents assert it was them who donated items such as portable fans. Parents also report that phone calls made to the Upper Canada District School Board and the Government of Ontario went unanswered, or failed to produce results. With some parents making reports of heatstroke and fevers, and Michael’s own baby going home every night last week inexplicably screaming after a day in the heat, parents simply didn’t know where to turn, or whose responsibility it was to get the A/C fixed as quickly as possible.
“It is the responsibility of the childcare centre or the school board to rent portable A/C units, because this is a health and safety issue,” said Michael. However, school board policy generally doesn’t allow portable A/C units in its schools, due to concerns over the capacity of older buildings to handle the electrical load. Limited exceptions are made in the summer months, but its not likely that Happyface personnel were authorized to do so in this case.
All problems have an eventual solution. Last week, it seemed all parents could do was hope that the A/C would be turned back on sooner rather than later.