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City Agrees to Help South Williamsburg Day Care After Center Files Lawsuit

By Serena Dai | September 2, 2015 6:15pm
 Nuestros Ninos Day Care Center was slated for closure, but city officials say they've gotten a verbal agreement for a long-term lease.
Nuestros Ninos Day Care Center was slated for closure, but city officials say they've gotten a verbal agreement for a long-term lease.
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Facebook/Nuestros NInos

SOUTH WILLIAMSBURG — Officials said they’ve gotten a verbal agreement to keep a more than 40-year-old South Williamsburg day care center open — an announcement that came right after the center filed a lawsuit against the city over the threat of closure.

Nuestros Ninos Day Care Center sued the city this week, accusing Mayor Bill de Blasio and the Administration for Children Services (ACS) of cutting the day care program without seeking community input and disparately impacting the largely Latino community.

The day care was on the chopping block after the city couldn't secure a lease for a building at 384 South Fourth St., making it the third local center for low-income North Brooklyn residents to be cut or put in jeopardy in the last year.

St. Nicks Alliance is still in court in hopes of saving the Swinging Sixties Senior Center, and Bushwick United Learning Center closed after a court ruled that the city botched its lease.

But shortly after Nuestros Ninos filed the lawsuit and announced a press conference, the city reached out and said it is negotiating with the landlord for a long-term lease, said Adam Meyers, a Brooklyn Legal Services attorney representing Nuestros Ninos.

Meyers and the center canceled the Wednesday press conference after getting word, he said.

"It is a relief to hear that the city is continuing to work for us, and we urge the city to do what needs to be done to keep the center alive," Meyers said.

ACS said agreements with the landlord ensure that EarlyLearn services will continue at Nuestros Ninos at least until the end of January 2016.

The agency also recently got a verbal commitment from the landlord for a more long-term lease, part of negotiations that have been happening for some time, officials said.

The Department of City Administrative Services, which negotiated the lease, said discussions have been "ongoing" but did not clarify for how long. The property’s landlord was not available for comment on Wednesday.

It was not clear whether the lawsuit directly sparked the announcement.

“Providing affordable, quality early education is a priority for this Administration and we are actively working with our partner city agencies to renew the lease at various day care sites in an effort to continue providing quality early care and education services,” ACS said in a statement.

Meyers said the center will not pursue further litigation if the city ultimately succeeds in securing a written long-term lease, but they're leaving the option open just in case.

Nuestros Ninos, which requires about $3 million annually in state and city contracts to operate, serves about 340 children largely from low-income, Spanish-speaking families in South Williamsburg.

The city marked Nuestros Ninos for closure due to problems in securing an affordable lease in Williamsburg.

The day care filed the lawsuit this week after months of feeling ignored by the city, Meyers said.

Officials had given little indication on whether negotiations were being productive, leading the day care to think that officials weren’t invested in the center, he said.

"We have no particular desire to make this antagonistic," Meyers said. "We would love to work with the city to keep it open."