PARENTS and community members have strongly criticised the Bridgetown-Greenbushes Shire Council's decision to close the Bridgetown Recreation Centre's crèche services.
The crèche facility has been providing a child minding service, available onsite to members and visitors of the recreation centre, since its inception 11 years ago.
It allows parents and caregivers to utilise the gymnasium, fitness classes and swimming pool on weekday mornings while having their babies and children entertained and cared for in a safe environment, helping ensure the demands of parenting do not hinder their exercise regime.
Council has determined that the crèche is too expensive and is under-utilised so has decided to cease the service.
Shire Chief Executive Tim Clynch said the decision was made as part of an ongoing service review across the Shire of Bridgetown-Greenbushes operations.
"Council in listening to community concerns regarding core business service delivery, is reviewing all levels of service and identifying areas of concern," Mr Clynch said.
Shire President Tony Pratico said the cost for the crèche facility was too high and other services could be offered in the front room currently being utilised.
"A review of crèche services over the past six years has shown a serious down turn in usage, even though the recreation centre memberships had increased," Cr Pratico said.
"Delivering crèche services costs approximately $36,000 each year while generating, on average, between $2000-$3000 income due to the small number of families accessing the service. This is clearly not financial.
"We have had numerous approaches to get 24 hour access to the gymnasium. Although this could happen where the gymnasium currently is, the front room has been identified as the best area to do this."
Crèche users are angered and disappointed by the decision, with many saying they will no longer be able to utilise their gym memberships if the crèche is not available.
A number of online forums have shown the concern from parents and community members, with many parents suggesting they had planned to better utilise the service once the local swimming pool was re-opened.
Other parents have suggested if the Shire could better promote the crèche service and what activities the recreation centre has to offer, all the facilities would be better utilised.
Concerned parent Fiona Roberts said she had been using the crèche service for the past nine years and was very disappointed to hear it would suddenly no longer be available.
"With my husband working away a lot, this service has allowed me to attend the fitness classes and gymnasium while ensuring my children are nearby in a safe and happy environment. Without the crèche service, myself and many other users will find it very difficult to keep up our fitness," Mrs Roberts said.
"It just makes no sense to close such an important facility. It is stated in the Shire's Sport and Recreation Strategic Plan that participation in sport and recreation has social, cultural and physical benefits, improving physical and mental health, assisting with disease prevention and management. If this is the case, why would the shire then remove a service that supports parents in participating in activities aimed at achieving this?
"If you go and ask local health practitioners, they would agree that this is an essential service for the community. They are always looking at preventing illnesses that are on the rise, including mental health. They want people to stay out of the health system."
Bridgetown Greenbushes Shire Community Services Executive Manager Elizabeth Denniss said she has had many concerned parents contact her over the issue, but closing the Crèche facility was an important step in achieving improvements for operations within the recreation centre.
"There has been a review that looked at every single operation within the recreation centre to see what ran at a profit and what didn't," Ms Denniss said. "The crèche was one of two areas that stood out as not running at a profit.
"By closing this, it will allow us to better utilise the area that the crèche is in and provide services to other members of the community, such as fly-in fly-out workers. Reality is, the number of people that currently use the crèche service compared to how many may use a 24 hour gym is vastly different."
Hon. Robyn McSweeney, MLC, Member for the South West, said she would like to see the Shire reassess the situation and consider reducing the service rather than ceasing it altogether.
"It is always a bad thing to stop something that has been working since the centre opened. I would be very hesitant to take it away altogether. If they can't afford five days, perhaps they can have it operate for less days per week," she said.
"I was a young mother once and I can see the benefit of having a crèche on-site. In this day and age when obesity is a big problem, it is essential for mums to get out of the house and knowing that your child is safe while you are getting some exercise is very important.
"It may well be a space issue and the shire is entitled to use the rooms as they wish, to help build the services up. But they need to be very mindful that a service that has run for five days a week for 11 years is just going to cease, and I think that is a little unfair.
"There is plenty of space at the recreation centre, there really is enough space there for everyone."
