The City of Manteca is stepping up to meet a significantly increased demand for childcare being created by COVID-19 that is forcing all schools in San Joaquin County to start the year with distance learning.
The Park & Recreation Department’s emergency child care will be launched coinciding with the start of the Manteca Unified School District school year on Thursday, Aug, 6.
The program is aimed at helping Manteca households with either both parents or a single parent working who have to work when school is in session for remote learning and have been unable to find child care or supervision for their younger children.
It will be offered initially at Neil Hafley, Stella Brockman and Woodward elementary school sites from 7:30 a.m. to 5 p.m. Monday through Friday for ages 5 to 12. If demand warrants it, additional sites may be added. The emergency child care will only be offered when Manteca Unified has the distance learning model in place.
Deputy City Manager Toni Lundgren noted 40 families already had contacted the city to get their names on a list for space for when the city got a program in place.
“People are scrambling to find child care,” Lundgren said.
The program will offer arts and crafts, academic support, and social distance activities. Morning and afternoon snacks will be provided while parents will need to send a snack lunch.
The cooperative effort with Manteca Unified will have all appropriate social distancing in place including the requirement that all third graders and older must wear face masks. Staff and participants will be screened before entry.
The cost is $640 a month of $175 weekly.
Questions and enrollment are being handled by the Parks & Recreation Department at (209) 456-8600 or going to manetcagov.com/parks.
17 more deaths from
COVID-19 in county
Seventeen more people died in the 24 hour period ending at 12:35 p.m. Friday bringing the COVID-19 death toll in San Joaquin County to 168.
The San Joaquin County Department COVID-19 was still showing a significant drop in COVID-19 positive cases in dashboard information.
While the site listed the usual cautionary statement that they are experiencing significant delays due to increased testing volume there were only 141 new cases reported in the previous 24 hours. It was the second day in a row that new cases were less than 200 per day
At the same time those classified as recovered has increased significantly and is now at 10,172. That leaves 1,311 people out of a county population of 760,000 that are considered not recovered. Overall there have been 11,483 cases in the county since March.
The ICU bed situation in Manteca is still at 10 COVID-19 patients in ICU beds — 5 each at Doctors Hospital of Manteca as well as Kaiser Foundation Hospital of Manteca. The number of overall COVID-19 patients in Manteca hospitals is now at 14, down 11 from Thursday.
Overall there are 79 patients — down 1 from Thursday — in ICU beds throughout the county with another 69 beds used by patients with other critical health issues. That reflects a licensed capacity of 149 percent meaning 50 non-ICU licensed beds have been converted to ICU beds.
COVID-19 patients account for 53 percent of all ICU patients.
There are now 748 beds in the county’s seven hospitals in use — 35 more than the previous day. Those occupied by COVID-19 patients has dropped from 234 to 225. As of Thursday 76 percent of all available beds were in use with 30% of them being occupied by COVID-19 patients.
Those who don’t become ill that have tested positive as well as others who may have the virus and have not been tested who also may never get ill are all considered capable of transmitting COVID-19 to those that are vulnerable. That is why the state has mandated the seemingly healthy people need to wear face masks when required as well as social distance and wash hands to reduce the virus’s spread.
To contact Dennis Wyatt, email dwyatt@mantecabulletin.com
