Aurora day-care center under way

A day-care center planned for more than a decade on the Fox River's west bank in Aurora appears to be finally under way.

Mayor Tom Weisner announced Tuesday that the city has received just more than $2 million, from the state's 2009 capital bill, to get construction moving on the Aurora Early Learning Center. After settling on two previous sites, the 23,000 square foot day-care center will be located on Root Street on the site that was once the former police department parking lot.

"We own it and we obviously don't need it for police parking any more, and it's a great neighborhood to meet the need and it will fit in nicely with the Fred Rodgers Community Center over there," Weisner said. "I think we identified a strong need across the community for day care and early duration. This obviously is in an area that is heavily Hispanic, but it would be available to the entire community."

Weisner said the facility would be run by the One Hope United Child Development Program, which just opened a similar facility in Elgin. No one from the organization was available Tuesday night, but according to the website, One Hope United "supports both working and at-risk families by providing accessible, affordable, high-quality child care and early education to encourage the social, emotional, intellectual and physical development of children."

Their 10 state-licensed facilities are staffed by "dedicated early childhood professionals who strive to prepare children for lifelong learning."

Weisner said the $2 million will go into an escrow account to help fund the $5.5 million project.

A development agreement the city finalized last week will go before the city's finance committee on Tuesday and then to the city council for approval on July 27.

The planning proposal will go to the plan commission on July 14 before also heading to the council on July 27. Ideally construction would begin this fall, but Weisner said he expects a majority of the construction would occur next year.

"We're very happy to see that we're in the final stages of getting this done," Weisner said. "Construction won't be a bad thing for the community either, provide some jobs, hopefully as local as possible."