Merced County Board of Supervisors vote could open child care center

A new, vacant child-care center in Planada could be put to use soon, depending on a Board of Supervisors decision this morning.

The center was approved in 2008 as part of a larger farmworker housing project along Plainsburg Road near Planada.

According to approved planning documents, the child-care facility could only be used for children of migrant farmworkers living in the complex.

The child care center is finished and could serve 72 children each day, but the attached housing project hasn't even broken ground yet.

The Stanislaus County Office of Education, which runs migrant early education programs in several counties, will ask the supervisors this morning to approve the early opening of the child care center.

The housing complex is a project of the Merced County Housing Authority. The authority's grant funding for the project is in the final stage of a federal review, according to board documents. The housing authority can break ground as soon as the grant funding is received.

The complex, called the Felix Torres Housing Center, could eventually include 72 housing units for seasonal farmworkers and 52 units for year-round farmworkers.

The child care center includes five modular buildings. Twenty-one staffers would provide care to 32 infants and toddlers, as well as 40 preschoolers, if the project is approved.

Also on today's agenda:

The supervisors will interview 20 applicants for four open positions on the county's housing authority board.

The interviews will be at 8:30 a.m., and the new board members could be appointed at the end of the regular board meeting.

The board will hold two other public hearings for public works projects, both of which could lead to eminent domain lawsuits.

In the first hearing, the board will decide whether to use eminent domain to expand the intersection at Shanks Road and Letteau Avenue in Delhi.

Seven property owners in the area agreed to accept payments or services for their land.

The second public hearing could lead to an eminent domain lawsuit for the Campus Parkway Project, east of Merced.

A contract with Cal Fire for 2009-10 could be approved. The one-year agreement includes one promotion at the Dos Palos station, and a 3 percent reduction in the staff benefit rate.

A contract from the county recorder's office with a private company to restore several volumes of vital records.

The county has books on hand dating back to the 1850s and doesn't have the staff needed to repair the books.

It costs about $1,253 to restore a 400-page book, according to board documents.

Reporter Danielle E. Gaines can be reached at (209) 385-2477 or dgaines@mercedsun-star.com.