Knox City Council has voted to close 28 of its 30 Council-run kindergarten services and make the buildings available to other providers from 2025.
Council says it will now work in partnership with the Victorian Department of Education on an Expression of Interest process to seek alternate providers.
Mayor, Marcia Timmers-Leitch said there were kindergarten providers already operating in Knox and surrounding areas who were better equipped to grow and adapt their services than Council.
“There are big changes coming for kindergarten as part of the state government’s decision to increase hours, make kindergarten free and offer a second year of kindergarten before school,” she said.
“Independent providers can be more agile and flexible in the way they plan, adapt and deliver their services when kindergarten is their core business.
“Knox is one of very few councils left in Melbourne that directly provides kindergarten on the scale that we do, so the ongoing changes to this sector affect us more than other councils.
“Council delivers more than 100 services to our community. We need to balance kindergarten services against every other service to determine the best way to deliver value for our whole community.
“This makes it much more difficult to adapt to changing policy environments and government reforms, especially when funding has not kept up with the cost of providing many of the services we provide on behalf of state and federal governments.”
She said Council was committed to providing buildings and spaces for other providers to offer local sessional kindergarten for families.
“Council will continue providing sessional kindergarten at the Knox Children and Family Centres in Bayswater and Wantirna.”
“This will set a benchmark for the quality of kindergarten available in Knox. This was identified by a representative community panel as an important lever for Council to ensure the ongoing quality of services in Knox.
“Council has an important role to play in planning and supporting services for our youngest residents and their families, and the best way to do this is not always by being a direct service provider.”
The Mayor said reducing Council-run kindergarten services from 30 sites to just two would allow Council to refocus on planning for the municipality as a whole.
“This includes looking at the other roles we can play in supporting kindergarten, including supporting independent providers to establish and grow their services in the Knox area, providing infrastructure to support services and centralising registrations.”
“This is more aligned to the way most other councils operate.”
She said a public EOI process will be conducted to identify alternative providers.
“Our priority throughout this process has been to ensure all local families can access a mix of high-quality services in their local area, regardless of who is delivering them.”
“We will work with new providers and the Department of Education, which has primary responsibility for kindergarten, to ensure the continuity of quality care and education for children and families in Knox.”
Mayor Timmers Leitch said Council conducted a thorough review of kindergarten services over several years, which included consultation with staff and the community, prior to this week’s decision.
The decision will not come into effect until January 2025. Council-run kindergartens will continue to operate in 2024, offering 15 hours a week for three- and four-year-olds.
