By Lynn Binnie
Whitewater Banner staff
whitewaterbanner@gmail.com

At its August 19 meeting the Parks & Recreation Board heard a report from Program Coordinator Michelle Dujardin about the department’s plans to support parents in the midst of the evolving school year formats.

Daycare will be offered from 7:30 a.m. – 5:30 p.m. at the Downtown Armory for children K-5th grade. Participants may arrive and leave at any time during those hours. There’s a maximum of ten students and a minimum of four. The cost is $30/day per child, which includes two snacks; however, parents will provide a bag lunch. Ten work stations have been set up for the children’s school work, for which there will be two one-and-a-half hour periods set aside daily. The staff is prepared to assist the students with their digital learning; in fact, several of the staff attended training on the Seesaw online format. Work will be saved in draft form, so that parents will be able to review it before it is submitted to the teachers. As of the meeting, there is a waiting list, with no one on it, for the first two weeks of school.

After School: Will be available for children K-5th grade from 3-6 p.m. at each school on the day when a child has in-person learning. There’s a maximum of ten students and a minimum of four. The cost is $10/day.

For further information call the department at 262-473-0520.

In other business:

• Director Eric Boettcher reported that the siphons on Trippe Lake are beginning to drop the lake depth. There are three 12″ siphons, approximately 100′ long, which operate on gravity.
• Completion of the Cravath Lakefront Park Amphitheater is on schedule, with the grand opening scheduled for mid-September.
• Seniors in the Park will sponsor a car show on August 26.
• After clarification of the Governor’s facial covering order by the City Attorney, masks will be required in all areas of the Aquatic and Fitness Center with the exception of those who are swimming.
• Soccer begins next week.
• Average checkins at the Aquatic and Fitness Center in July were 89 per day compared with 149 in 2019. Only members are allowed to use the facility at this time. Use of the lap pool is by reservation, and it is functioning at 66% of capacity.
• There was discussion regarding whether there would be community trick-or-treating, with a variety of opinions expressed but no decision.

Posted below is the information about the children’s program that was included in the Parks & Recreation Board agenda packet.

Whitewater After School Program Reopening Plan
This is a working document and dependent on the current climate and status of Covid‐ 19. In
addition, we will take into consideration any direction given to us from City, County and State
guidelines that will be available at time of opening. Again, this is a working document and is
subject to change as we gather more information.

After school families were surveyed to help best determine family needs and program structure.
The survey was sent to 2019-2020 registered after school families, this totaled 109 users.
Families were given two weeks to respond to the survey, 44 response were received. ( Survey
Attached).
In response to the survey, the following programs have been created and currently open for
registration:

 Start date for full day program located at the Downtown Armory is
scheduled for Tuesday, Sept 1st through Friday, September 25th with a timeframe of
7:30am- 5:30pm. This program will take a maximum of 10 participants and a minimum
of 4 participants. This program has a structured schedule that allows two different time
blocks for connection to virtual learning with the help from Parks and Recreation Staff.

 Start date for partial day program located at each Elementary School is scheduled for
Tuesday, Sept 1st through Friday, Sept 25th with a timeframe of 3:00pm -6:00pm. This
program will take a maximum of 10 participants and a minimum of 4 participants.

Safety measure are highly important to us.
High touch surfaces will be wiped down every two hours, masks will be required, and,
when people enter hand sanitizer or hand washing will also be required.
Staff will meet requirements set by the city (mask, temp, reporting, etc)
In the event of a COVID-19 situation, the department will follow the Jefferson County Health
Department and current CDC Guidelines.