Girls Inc. in Carpinteria offers free childcare to victims of recent fires
CARPINTERIA, Calif.— Girls Inc. in Carpinteria is offering free childcare to victims of the recent fires for the next couple weeks.
“Any time a school is shut down or displaced and kids are not in their normal routine, it affects the parent. And we know parents need to work in order to afford to live” said Girls Inc Executive Director Jamie Collins.
Survivors didn’t just lose their homes. They lost their entire community.
“Schools were taken out. Libraries, grocery stores, banks. And so we've seen an influx in people coming into our community and immediately enrolling in school. So if these kids are here for a longer term, we're able to provide free after school programing for them to again, help build that sense of community around them,” said Collins.
The organization— which functions as a daycare and place of immersive learning— says Monday was the first day of welcoming in evacuees.
“It was kind of like a mixture of sadness because they are still feeling really heavy feelings, but also like a breath. I feel like when they got here, they were so excited to see the playground. They were excited to go into the gym and they were excited to start painting,” said Girls Inc. Program Manager Melissa Cornejo.
Melissa Cornejo says the LA fires hit close to home.
She is originally from LA, and her dad is a firefighter who is currently battling the Palisades Fire.
“It's like a bright sunny day here in Carpinteria. But the pictures he's sending, it's it looks like it's dark. They're all the action. And it's really scary,” said Cornejo.
Cornejo’s experience helps her understand what these kids are dealing with,and her expertise in childcare allows her to hold space for them and have difficult conversations.
The program is a small step to provide some normalcy for kids and parents during a trying time.
“They might just be at home hearing their parents and hearing the news and kind of get wrapped up more in that like deep cycle of just thinking about everything that's going on. So kind of giving them a couple of hours to come here and to be a kid, really, I think it's healthy for them. It's healthy for the parents to some of the parents just need a break and they need a breath and they need to just sit down and decompress away from their kids,” said Cornejo.
“We had a couple of kiddos today that were displaced because of the Eaton Fire. we had a little boy who's playing basketball in our gym earlier and just kind of running around the courtyard. The daughter was super into art and science. And so just sitting down and doing an art activity with her science experiment and just kind of meeting the kids where they are,” said Jamie Collins.
The free childcare program at Girls Inc is available Monday through Friday from 10 am to 1 pm.
On Thursday they’ll be hosting a community resilience fair with dinner, raffle prizes and fun activities from 5:30 pm to 7 pm to teach the community on how to be better prepared for emergencies year round.
