This afternoon, 23 June, the Youth Welfare Office of the City of Chemnitz invited the providers of daycare facilities in the Kappel district to an initial consultation on necessary changes to daycare needs planning. Representatives from various city council groups also took part.
There are currently seven daycare facilities in the Kappel district for the care of children of crèche and kindergarten age, which are operated by the five recognised independent youth welfare organisations Kinder-, Jugend- und Familienhilfe e. V. Chemnitz, Kindervereinigung Chemnitz e. V., Montessori-Verein Chemnitz e. V., Solaris Förderzentrum für Jugend und Umwelt gGmbH Sachsen and Sächsische Sozialakademie gGmbH. Three of these facilities also offer places for after-school care for children who attend the Valentina Tereschkowa primary school and the Dr Salvador Allende primary school.
The starting point for necessary changes in the Kappel district is an overcapacity of existing childcare places in relation to the number of births of resident children. For this reason, the providers of all existing daycare centres here are now being asked to work together with the City of Chemnitz Youth Welfare Office to find ways to reduce the number of childcare places by around 150 and to make better use of the existing infrastructure.
At today's initial consultation with the providers of the daycare facilities in the Kappel district, the provider Solaris Förderzentrum für Jugend- und Umwelt gGmbH Sachsen, as operator of the "Kappelino" children's and family centre in cooperation with the neighbouring "Glückskäfer" children's and family centre run by Kindervereinigung Chemnitz e.V. The "Kappelino" children's house for the care of children of crèche and kindergarten age and a branch of the "Kappelino" day nursery for schoolchildren from the Valentina Tereschkowa primary school are located at Irkutsker Straße 15 under the umbrella of the children's and family centre.
The provider Solaris Förderzentrum für Jugend- und Umwelt gGmbH Sachsen has already created additional after-school care places at the Irkutsker Straße 15 site with the daycare needs plan up to 2025 (B-158/2023) in order to be able to continue to offer all children at Valentina Tereschkowa primary school a childcare place in line with demand. Since the 2022/2023 school year, the primary school has been growing into a three-form entry primary school and will reach full three-form entry in the next school year 2025/2026. In addition, children of primary school age with a migration background will be taught in two preparatory classes. These developments are increasingly leading to a tense space situation in the school building of Valentina Tereschkowa Primary School for school and after-school care operations with foreseeable qualitative restrictions for the after-school care programme.
The challenges of contributing to the reduction of childcare places in the crèche and kindergarten sector on the one hand, while at the same time the shortage of space for the after-school care centre is steadily worsening on the other, have led the provider Solaris Förderzentrum für Jugend- und Umwelt gGmbH Sachsen to decide to reduce the number of childcare places for children of crèche and kindergarten age at the Irkutsker Straße 15 site in the coming 2025/26 school year and to create additional childcare places for children of after-school care age instead.
In a first step towards change at the Irkutsker Straße 15 location, the parents of 22 children of crèche and kindergarten age will be offered the opportunity to use free places at the similarly structured "Glückskäfer" children's and family centre run by Kindervereinigung Chemnitz e. V. at Ústí nad Labem 119 Street from 1 January 2026.
In summer 2026, a further 22 children will leave the "Kappelino" children's centre as school starters, meaning that a total of 56 childcare places for children of crèche and kindergarten age will remain available in the long term. Rooms and outdoor areas that become available in the children's centre will be converted for after-school care, with the aim of being able to care for after-school children from up to six primary school classes at Valentina Tereschkowa Primary School at Irkutsker Straße 15 from the 2026/27 school year.
The City of Chemnitz Youth Welfare Office is planning further consultations for the Kappel district as part of the update of the daycare centre requirements plan, as well as similar consultations in other districts of Chemnitz, in order to develop strategies for reducing overcapacity in childcare places together with independent youth welfare organisations and their daycare centres. The resolution on the new daycare centre requirements plan is scheduled to be passed by the city council in the 4th quarter of 2025.
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