ROCHELLE — Rochelle City Manager Jeff Fiegenschuh said Friday, Aug. 20 that the city has “hit a brick wall everywhere we've turned” in efforts to help get a daycare facility back in town after Kishwaukee Family YMCA Child Care Center at 1010 N. 15th St. closed last year.

Rochelle Mayor John Bearrows said earlier this summer that the city, with the help of Rochelle Township High School District #212, was endeavoring to utilize part of May School as a possible daycare facility with an outside director after attempts to purchase and utilize the YMCA building did not come to fruition. 

Fiegenschuh said a longer term lease at May School wouldn’t be possible in case the school district needed the building again. 

“What happens if they want to bring kids back into that school and they need the school back?” Fiegenschuh said. “What do you do with the daycare center if it's successful? I think May School is off the table. I don't know. Maybe, maybe not. Maybe we'll revisit it.”

Even if May School was back on the table, there was a $50,000-60,000 a year expense for property taxes and lease and utility payments that would have to be paid for, Fiegenschuh said. That doesn’t include payroll. He said daycare centers are very payroll intensive.

“It's an expensive endeavor and who's going to pay for that?” Fiegenschuh said. “If we could go out and raise $300,000-400,000 to cover building expenses, great. But that only covers you for 5-6 years. Long-term, how do you pay for it? I don't know. There's no easy answer. I just know the city shouldn't be paying for everything. I don't have a problem with helping, but it shouldn't be all on our back."

Fiegenschuh said the city has had “a lot” of meetings related to getting a daycare back in town and a lot of staff time has been spent on it. A current idea is trying to start up a 501c3 nonprofit to take it on.

He said people would be more likely to help with a nonprofit because of tax incentives. 

“I really hope we look at starting a not for profit and let them go out and fundraise for it,” Fiegenschuh said. “Maybe the city can be part of that. And try to find a location. It would be nice if we could find somebody to run it and they could use the old YMCA location.”

The city manager said the YMCA is looking at selling its building, but the city council isn’t going to spend the money it takes to buy it. 

The way the building is set up, Fiegenschuh is unsure what else it could be used for. 

“At the end of the day, I don't want to commit the city financially in perpetuity to running a daycare,” Fiegenschuh said. “We weren't running it before and it's not really our job to run it now."

Fiegenschuh recognized the need for a daycare in town and said he can’t imagine the stress residents are going through trying to find somebody to watch their kids while they’re at work. 

There is a core group of about nine people involved in the efforts to bring a daycare back to town including Fiegenschuh, Bearrows, city staff, representatives from out of town that have run daycare centers, people from the Rochelle Area Community Foundation and volunteers in town. 

“It's not like people who want a daycare center are actively giving us ideas on how to get this done,” Fiegenschuh said. “We've been talking about this for the past year and it just seems everywhere we turn it's just another hurdle to jump. We don't want to give up, but nine people trying to solve this is not enough."