A new child care center coming to Pierce County will have a barn, livestock, 200 spots

Apr. 25—Jowell Scott spent her childhood in the Tacoma area experiencing the outdoors firsthand.

When she was a child, her grandma would bring them to a local farm, during which they'd jump into a hay pile and milk cows. They would also occasionally "taste the flavors of the Earth" by chewing on raw rhubarb from a neighbor's garden.

"It was an experience that I don't think all the kids that I grew up around ever really had," Scott said.

In a couple of years, about 200 children will get to have similar experiences at a new child care center that will be built in Puyallup.

Scott is one of the many employees at Farm 12 — a restaurant, bakery and events venue established by a nonprofit called Step By Step. The nonprofit aims to get women the support and resources they need to have healthy pregnancies and families.

Founder Krista Linden said she has plans to expand Farm 12. In the next couple of years, employees and other families in the area will get the opportunity to use a newly built early learning center near the restaurant at 3303 Eighth Ave. SE.

"Those early learning years are the most formative years in a child's life," Linden said. "We are going to build a phenomenal center because it's phenomenally important."

The early learning center will have a mixture of indoor and outdoor amenities. There are plans to have a multipurpose barn, greenhouse as well as an area for livestock like goats, pigs and sheep.

About 200 children 5 and under will be able to use the early learning center. Farm 12's 30-40 employees will have priority registration and it will open to other families in the area after that, Linden said.

Linden said some of those spots will be for infant care. They also plan to ensure hours are flexible because most child care centers have strict time frames. There are plans to make costs flexible as well.

The early learning center will cost about $12 million. It will be partially paid for by grants from the state Department of Commerce, Pierce County and funds Farm 12 has already put aside for the center. They are still looking for donations, Linden said. They have secured about $2.5 million of the $12 million so far.

Linden said they hope to finish construction by summer 2024 so it can be open for the fall 2024 school year. The YMCA will help run the early learning center. She wanted to partner with an organization that emphasizes physical activities and the outdoors.

The original plan was to partner with existing child care centers so Farm 12 employees have someplace to bring their children, Linden said. But when the pandemic hit, employees expressed their struggles with finding facilities that were still open.

That is when the conversation around Farm 12 having its early learning center began, Linden said. They held a town hall in February 2022, during which people shared their needs and want in a child care center.

About 80 people attended the town hall, Linden said. Parents, families, teachers, pediatricians and other people that have ties to child care were present. They made it clear that they wanted their kids to have child care that lets them interact with the outdoors.

"If you were to sum up what they want in one phrase — they want to bathe their kids in dirt," Linden said.

Scott has three children (13, 12 and 5) and one on the way. Before she goes to work, she drives from her Parkland home to drop off her children at her mother's place near the edge of Edgewood, or her father's place in Tacoma.

Before Scott's parents agreed to help her, Scott found a day care that worked for her, but it closed down during the pandemic. Before she found the day care, she would look for local babysitters through community sites.

"Farm 12 has been really great about understanding family needs," Scott said. "To have something like that child care (center) so close to my job would be a huge lifesaver."

Rachel Hamilton, another Farm 12 employee, drops off her 4- and 5-year-old children at a child care center but the journey to where she is now was difficult. She recalls crying many nights when the centers she used to frequent shut down during the pandemic.

Now her work is helping fund the new center and her experiences and recommendations are helping craft it to make it accessible for other families.

"I wish the early learning center was something that I could benefit from, but it means so much to me that I'm able to sow into it now for other mothers," Hamilton said.

This story was originally published April 24, 20225:00 AM.

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