Baby Gym, a Dance Palace Community Center program for babies and toddlers that has run for three decades, will return this Tuesday after it was cut this summer as part of an attempt to reign in a budget shortfall.
The free program, which provides a space for parents and young children to socialize, is getting off the ground only a few weeks late this year. But so far the Dance Palace has secured just part of the funding to carry the program till next summer, when it typically takes a hiatus. But that funding is only guaranteed for one year. Both the nonprofit and parents are investigating supplementary financial support, as well as how to ensure the program’s longevity in an area where venues for little kids to play together are few and far between.
“We don’t see a lot of support for young families [in West Marin]. This is one of the only programs we have,” said Maria Niggle, who used to work for First 5 Marin Children and Families Commission, an agency that funds early childhood development programs and which provided funds for Baby Gym until its budget was scaled back about three years ago.
As a mother of an 18-month old and a 5-year-old, Ms. Niggle has been an active Baby Gym participant. “It’s a sweet, small, modest program that can make a really big impact,” she said.
Carol Friedman and Kate Munger started the program around 1981 when the two had young children, according to Ms. Friedman, the founding executive director of the Dance Palace. Originally, parents facilitated the program and there was no teacher; that started in the 1990s. In more recent years, Ms. Niggle said, Baby Gym has incorporated a few more activities like story time and Spanish-language sing-alongs, though it still largely consists of free playtime.
According to Dan Mankin, the community center’s current director, the cost of the program, roughly $5,000 a year, was covered by a mixture of grassroots funding—catalyzed by Fred Smith— and income from the center’s other programs. The center briefly charged parents a fee, but stopped when families didn’t show up.
The Dance Palace ended its last fiscal year with a major loss: $30,000 in the red. So when Mr. Mankin and the board were assembling a budget for the fiscal year that started in July, Baby Gym was on the chopping block. “It’s a beautiful program, but without grant income, we made a hard decision—this has no financial support from grants and we’re in a really tight year,” Mr. Mankin, who has three grown daughters of his own, said. He added that the program had lagging participation—some weeks up to seven or eight kids would come, other weeks only three or four, based on sign-in sheets. (Ms. Niggle noted that attendance would often drop off when sunny skies lured families to West Marin’s rich open spaces.)
Other Dance Palace programs are being trimmed, Mr. Mankin said: there will be roughly 15 to 20 percent fewer performing arts shows and fewer after-school programs. For some youth classes—like after-school cooking and a rhythm percussion class—low enrollment couldn’t justify the cost. At the same time, there will be more adult classes because those are mostly supported by their own income or grants, Mr. Mankin said, adding that the center is also offering free space for Latino community events, like the upcoming mole tasting that will raise money for Gallery Route One’s Latino Photography Project, and a monthly Friday night event for local musicians.
Ms. Niggle said once she’d learned through the community grapevine that the program had been cut, she reached out to other parents to see if there was some way to save or reinvent Baby Gym. Many of them pressed the nonprofit to bring it back.
That prompted the Dance Palace to scour West Marin for money to pay a teacher, Maria Mercado, and keep it going. It has secured $3,000 from West Marin School through a school readiness grant the district receives from the Marin Community Foundation to close an achievement gap between high and low-income students as well as Anglos and Latinos.
For Ms. Niggle, Baby Gym provides an opportunity for kids to develop motor skills on equipment like crawl-through tunnels and to play with other children—often for the first time if they have no siblings. But it’s also a place for parents who feel alone or overwhelmed to meet other parents. “Baby gym is not just a play group,” Ms. Niggle said, “but a way for parents and caregivers to commune with other parents and caregivers in a space that is safe and stimulating for their young children. This program helps combat the effects of isolation for them and their children.”
Jenna D’Anna, an Inverness resident with a 2-year-old son, Matteo, said she has met some of her closest friends on Tuesday and Thursday mornings. “It’s a regular part of our lives,” she said.
Both the Latino and Anglo communities in West Marin take advantage, Ms. Niggle said, in part a result of outreach she and her colleague Alex Porrata undertook when First 5 began funding the program. “Latino parents use it. Anglo parents use it. There’s a cross cultural exchange there,” she said. The county library also arranges for someone to accompany children while moms and dads take English language classes at its Point Reyes Station branch.
The Dance Palace is currently searching for the extra $2,000 to keep the program going through the school year. Mr. Mankin said they could always make the space available for parents if they wanted to organize it themselves, but as for next year, it remains to be seen if money will be available for a teacher.
Ms. Niggle said that parents she’s talked to are also realizing they might need to take on a more proactive role—perhaps holding fundraisers, finding another organization to participate or helping with the management to ensure the program doesn’t end.
“Because it’s such a little modest program, it’s easy to lose sight of all the benefits,” Ms. Niggle said. “But you don’t know what you have until you lose it.”
Baby Gym takes place on Tuesdays and Thursdays from 9:30 to 11 a.m. at the Dance Palace Community and Cultural Center. Anyone with ideas about how to fund or otherwise support the program can write to Dan Mankin at [email protected].