Directors to vote on daycare rule change, golf water

The Fort Smith Board of Directors approved Tuesday to place on its April 21 voting agenda a measure that would allow daycares operating in residential areas to hire one permanent employee.

Presently, such daycares are limited to 12 children and can hire no outside employees. City Director Don Hutchings said the policy is to prevent a home from becoming a “commercial enterprise” within a neighborhood by adding employees and traffic.

However, a daycare representative said the policy doesn’t allow residential daycare owners to hire a substitute when the owner needs to be out for childcare training. Officials with the Arkansas Department of Human Services, which regulates daycares, said such training has allowed residential daycares to close the gap on the quality of care provided by larger, commercial daycare operations.

City Director Steve Tyler moved the board consider allowing residential daycares to hire one permanent employee. Receiving a second — placing items on an agenda requires approval from two directors — the item was placed on the board’s April 21 voting meeting.

GOLF WATER
The Fianna Hills Country Club is asking the city to change its water use classification to reduce the cost of irrigating the golf course. Club owner Jim Shields said the new rate structure for irrigation represents a “severe shock” to the club’s finances. He said the club has lost money in the past five years.

The option presented the city board was to move Fianna Hills to a customer class that would potentially lower the club’s water bill by $13,933 in 2009, and $17,589 in 2010. The full effect of creating a new “golf” class of commercial users would be to reduce the city’s water revenue by almost $50,000 in 2010. There are five golf courses within the city’s water system. The tradeoff would be to raise non-golf commercial rates by 2 cents per CCF (748 gallons).

This new class for golf courses was placed on the board’s April 21 voting agenda.