RIVERTON - After a hitch in its giddy-up, a first-of-its-kind project in the Cowboy State is finally out of the gate.

Workers started construction today on a new kind of child care center, which will be privately run but built with public funds. Officials say it will provide a needed infusion of child care to this community.

"This should enable people to work after nine to five, to do shift work," said Alan Moore, accountant and president of the Riverton Chamber of Commerce. "This should enable people to enter the work force."

The facility will be erected using a $1.48 million economic development grant from the Wyoming Business Council on a piece of land adjacent to Central Wyoming College's Equine Center, and next door to the Smart Start Academy preschool.

The building will be owned by IDEA Inc., a Riverton economic development group, which will lease the facility to the owners of Smart Start Academy, Dee and Donna Harrison.

The Harrisons will rent the building from IDEA, but they will own and operate the new educational day care service housed within. The business is tentatively called Smart Start Quality Child Care, and it should be able to serve 90 to 100 children, Donna Harrison said.

At a groundbreaking ceremony Wednesday, several elected officials and civic leaders expressed a mixture of optimism and relief that the project was finally getting off the ground.

"If it wasn't for the owners and operators of Smart Start Academy, this probably wouldn't have gone forward," said Jim Davis, city councilman and executive director of the Riverton Chamber.

"This overnight success started in 2004," said Moore.

After the initial owner for the child care business backed out, Moore said IDEA moved in because a simple reality persists in the community: If a parent, or particularly a single parent, wants to work hours that don't fall between 9 a.m. and 5 p.m., Monday through Friday, he or she has no formal options for child care.

The purpose of the Wyoming Business Council grant, called a Business Ready Community Grant, is to help spur economic development in Cowboy State communities.

The Wyoming Business Council has awarded more than $113 million in Business Ready Community Grants since 2003, according to the agency, and the maximum award for each proposal is $1.5 million.

In the case of the Riverton project, community and business leaders in and around Riverton identified child care as a critical need in Fremont County in 2004. They determined that a lack of child care - especially in the early mornings, late evenings and weekends - was making it impossible for many single parents and primary caregivers who wanted jobs to take on employment.

Because of a general shortage of workers in Riverton, as is the case in most Wyoming communities, freeing parents who want to work should at least help provide the town with some needed labor, Davis said.

Harrison started her preschool in her basement in 1980, she said, with about 10 students, and now she has about 120 children who attend her academy, along with an average of 25 children per day who come to day care in the same building.

Harrison teaches courses on early childhood development at Central Wyoming College. The new child care operation, she said, will be more than a traditional day care facility because the workers will be required to have some academic background in early childhood development. And the curriculum will focus on intellectual, physical and social growth for the children.

The operation will also be open, as long as there is demand, from 5 a.m. to 11 p.m., said Phil Christopherson, Riverton's economic development director.

Sheridan and Kemmerer are also now in the process of designing similar projects.

Reach reporter Chris Merrill at chris.merrill@trib.com or at (307) 267-6722.

News Tracker

Last we knew: A proposed $1.48 million child care center in Riverton was derailed by higher-than-expected construction bids.

The latest: Workers started construction today on the new facility, now four years in the making.

What's next: The center, billed by community leaders and elected officials as a prototype project for other communities, should be up and running in April 2009.