CLAYTON • The Clayton Child Center and Clayton Academy soon will be shuttered, mostly due to a decline in enrollment. But a newly organized center with a new board of directors — the Clayton Early Childhood Center — will open June 4 in Clayton's Oak Knoll Park, where the previous center's infant-toddler program was housed.
The new, nonprofit center will offer programs for children ages 6 weeks to 5 years. According to a member of the new board of directors, the new center will not be overseen by the previous center's executive director and founder, Barbara E. Geno, who in January surprised parents with a letter informing them that the longstanding center would close May 31.
The new group, formed as a partnership between parents and teachers, will pay the city of Clayton $1,414 in June rent for the property, but future lease payments are being negotiated, Clayton City Manager Craig Owens said. January marked the first time in about 20 years that the previous center had to pay more than $1 a year in rent (not including maintenance and utility costs) for the Oak Knoll Park property. Since January, the lease agreement has required $1,414 a month.
