Four Brooklyn childcare sites were told by the city’s Department of Education they are being forced to close — and were notified less than 24 hours before applications opened for the upcoming school year — Brooklyn elected officials said Friday.
The closures, which will force parents to scramble for options, are part of a trend of cuts and closures to early childhood programs as affordable child care remains out of reach for many families, despite promises to expand options from the mayor and governor, officials said.
The shutdowns will impact 250 children and 90 staffers across four sites: Grand Street Settlement — a pre-K and 3-K site in Bushwick that Gov. Hochul toured as she announced a fund to build new childcare facilities earlier this month — Nuestros Niños, a South Williamsburg center that has been operating for over five decades, Friends of Crown Heights in Crown Heights and Fort Green Council in Bed-Stuy. Another site in Queens was also told their lease would end, too.
In a separate development, the news comes a day after Adams’ preliminary budget plan left off $112 million currently allocated for 3-K, a move that could put thousands of early childhood seats at risk of being eliminated by the summer.
The city blamed the four Brooklyn closings on new rent rates at almost double the price and low enrollment numbers, according to a release — although officials said the city’s data shows lower-than-actual enrollment numbers and census data shows significant needs for child care.
A schools spokesperson did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
The decision was a “betrayal” from the Adams administration, Councilmember Jennifer Gutiérrez said, whose office said the city did not negotiate with the private landlords who own the lot.
“Nuestros Niños survived the fiscal crisis of the 1970s, but it cannot survive Eric Adams’ DOE,” Gutiérrez said of the site in her district. “Slashing funding, abandoning providers, and making families bear the brunt of the city’s inaction are not solutions — they are failures of leadership.”
Haide Valerio, a longtime resident of Williamsburg, may be both out of a job and her daughter’s childcare with the closure of Nuestros Niños: She is both a parent and employee at the center.
“I am a single mom so the closure of the center is extremely heartbreaking,” Valerio, 27, said. “And it has left me very distraught. I’m trying to navigate like, what would that look like for me in the next year?”
Valerio is worried about being able to afford other childcare centers for her three-year-old daughter.
Brooklyn Borough President Antonio Reynoso, who went to the Williamsburg center, slammed the move as an “abdication of responsibility” from the city.
“It will be Brooklyn’s families who will have to pick up the pieces,” he said. “If Mayor Adams is serious about creating a city for families, it starts with ensuring access to high-quality, safe, and stable child care options in the neighborhoods these families have long called home.”
Robert Cordero, CEO of Grand Street Settlement, implored the city to keep the site open by negotiating a new lease.
“The DOE’s decision to close our site due to real estate considerations jeopardizes vital early childhood education for hard working immigrant families,” he said in a statement.
With Cayla Bamberger