Hampton a model of civic cooperation

Hampton School Supt. Holly Herzberg said it best: “If you live in Hampton and there’s a need and there’s a project, you’re going to find people to support it and get it done.” That statement, made at the Nov. 14 ribbon cutting for the new Hawks Learning Center, home of the town’s first non-profit daycare center, exemplifies the kind of community spirit of cooperation that has characterized Hampton for years. 
Less than two years ago, in the spring of 2023 as long-time in-home daycare provider Sharon Goertzen was preparing to retire, a daycare center was identified during a community workshop as one of the three top needs of the eastern Hamilton County village. Soon a group of volunteers that had sprung up around the concept, led by the Hampton Public Schools Foundation, began discussing the possibility of converting the recently closed Hampton Lutheran School building into such a facility. Within months, the foundation had worked out a deal with the building’s owner, St. Peter Lutheran Church, to purchase the facility. Soon the sale was complete and the building was renamed as the Hawks Learning Center. 
After that things moved quickly as a governing board was formed to oversee the non-profit organization known as the Hampton Day Care Foundation, grants began to come in toward the purchase and renovation of the building, and the folks of Hampton, young and old, rolled up their sleeves and went to work this past summer to clean and remodel the building inside and out to get it ready for its first crop of kids. With lots of elbow grease and hundreds of volunteer hours by community members, the work was completed, the state inspections were passed and the facility opened in August, just in time for the new school year. 
When the ribbon was cut at the grand opening of the facility last month, there were 18 children being looked after daily at the center and two more infants were expected to be added to that number soon. 
But, as with any new enterprise, the work of the Hampton Day Care Foundation is really just beginning. Operating a daycare center is not cheap and such facilities are not normally a money-making operation, so organizers will have the ongoing concern of finding funding for the daycare’s day-to-day operating expenses to supplement the fees paid by the parents who use it. 
But if Hampton continues to be Hampton, we have a feeling the Hawks Learning Center will ring with the happy voices of children for many years to come. 
– Ron Burtz