When OpenFile Ottawa asked Ottawa Centre candidates how they would make more child care options available to parents in the riding, two candidates pointed to a proposed expansion at the Children’s Centre at Hilson Avenue Public school in Westboro as an opportunity.

“If they just had some money—and I've been trying to get some money through the infrastructure dollars—to expand, they could provide more spaces,” NDP candidate Paul Dewar says.

But Liberal candidate Scott Bradley criticized Dewar, who is the incumbent, for not doing more to fight for the expansion. Bradley described it as a “missed opportunity.”

“If that was a priority, why didn't it get done?” Bradley asked.

Some further investigation by OpenFile takes a little air out of that political football. That’s ecause a long-standing plan to add a second story to the Children’s Centre wouldn’t actually create any new full-time child care spaces. Instead, the expansion would accommodate 65 school-aged children who now receive care in three classrooms rented from Hilson Avenue Public School.

Eleonore Benesch, a past executive director of the Children's Centre and now an honourary member of its board of directors, says that arrangement will probably end when the school adds a new full-day kindergarten program.

“By the year 2012, we will probably lose the use of the rented classrooms,” she explains.

Benesch served as executive director of the Children’s Centre for 35 years. She says a second story was part of the original plan when the current Children’s Centre building went up in the late '90s, but funding fell short. Now, there's a temporary roof on the first level.

“When the federal government came out with the infrastructure program, we applied and we told them that we were more than shovel ready,” Benesch says.

But the Children's Centre didn't receive any federal infrastructure money. The expansion would cost an estimated $2.5 million, and $500,000 has already been fundraised.

Benesch says accommodating those 65 school-aged children is a priority. And although an expanded centre might be able to accommodate limited care for some younger children, it would not be full-time care.

“We could probably add some part-time programs. Maybe 30 children. I hesitate to put a number on it,” Benesch says.

Kris Birchard is a member of the centre’s board of directors and chair of a task force supporting the expansion. Both he and Benesch say that Paul Dewar has been supportive of the expansion.

“Would it have been different if a member for a different party, say Mr. Bradley, had been the MP? Who knows?” Birchard says.