Preliminary Analysis Indicates 624 Child Care Facilities in the Path of Feb. 2 Florida Tornadoes

FEB. 5, 2007 | A preliminary analysis of central Florida’s tornado-damaged areas indicates 624 child care facilities, with a capacity to serve 32,942 children, may have been in the path of February 2 storms that killed at least 20 persons.

The early-morning tornadoes caused heavy damage in scattered areas of four counties, potentially striking 50 or more child care facilities where young children could have been staying overnight.

Analysts with the Early Childhood Atlas Readiness Project identified early care and education facilities, including child care centers, family child care homes, Head Start centers, and pre-kindergarten sites, in damage areas initially mapped by the New York Times.  (See maps at right.) The atlas project is a collaboration of the Mississippi State University Early Childhood Institute and the Community Information Resource Center of the Rural Policy Research Institute at the University of Missouri.

The Atlas team merged and geocoded lists from the Florida Department of Children and Families, the federal Head Start Bureau, the Florida Bureau of Child Nutrition Programs, and the National Center for Education Statistics to create a map “layer” that matched the boundaries of the tornado damage areas that are within Lake, Seminole, Sumter, and Volusia Counties, the four counties declared disaster areas by the Federal Emergency Management Agency. Thus, these preliminary numbers are more precise than county-wide totals, and provide a basis for estimating the challenge of assessing losses to the child care sector.

The early care and education facilities in the approximate damage areas include 304 licensed centers and 320 home-based child care providers. The centers include 14 Head Start and Early Head Start centers and 71 facilities that receive subsidies from the federal Child and Adult Care Food Program. Approximately 99 public pre-kindergarten sites also are in the damage areas.

The precise number and locations of facilities reported to offer 24-hour care could not be determined because the physical addresses were not available for many of those facilities. However, the 50 centers and family child care homes for which locations could be determined have a combined maximum capacity of 1,657 children.

46 Blackjack Rd. / P.O. Box 6013 / Mississippi State, MS / 39762
tel. 662-325-4836 / fax 662-325-5436

© 2004- Mississippi State University