By Niki Cervantes
Staff Writer

June 15, 2015 -- Construction of a multimillion-dollar child care center for the Santa Monica Civic Center – developed in partnership with Santa Monica College (SMC) – moved forward last week when the City Council agreed to lease City-owned land for the project.

The Early Childhood Education Center – a project 20 years in the making – isn’t expected to break ground for another two years, but the council last Tuesday needed to sign off on several motions to move construction forward.

About 1.6 acres owned by the City in the Civic Center will be leased long-term to SMC, likely for a dollar. The City also will contribute $5.56 million toward the project.

SMC, which will build and operate the center, is responsible for the remaining cost.  How much that will be is as yet undetermined, one official said. The original cost was estimated at about $12.5 million, but that has grown as construction has lagged.

As originally envisioned, the center was to be a single building and the overall project 16,000 square feet. That changed, officials said, when utility lines interfered with the design’s blueprints.

What was approved by the council Tuesday instead is a center with three buildings encompassing 20,000 square feet.

The board’s unanimous vote also increased the maximum height from 25 feet to 40 feet and the number of children served from 100 to 110. The facility will provide space for the SMC’s Early Childhood Education Department teaching center and extra meeting space for community-based agencies.

The council, in an amendment, asked that top priority be given to children of residents, although Councilmember Terry O’Day also worried about the childcare needs of  City employees.

Some critics have voiced concern about the City signing a long-term, low-cost lease for  land that would otherwise fetch a healthy price. Those who showed up at a sparsely attended public hearing Thursday, however, were generally supportive of the project.

O’Day said daycare is much needed in the busy civic center, and Councilwoman Gleam Davis called the childcare center “the perfect civic endeavor.”

Davis said that studies have shown early childhood education is linked to lower rates of poverty, incarceration, teenage pregnancy and other problems. She also said the center will help close the achievement gap, decrease special education needs and improve public academic performance overall.

“If we are interested in creating a better community, early childhood education is a key piece of that,” Davis said. “It seems (there is) no better place.”