A Longmont-area childcare and co-working enterprise is one of five businesses lauded recently by Gov. Jared Polis for championing employee ownership in Colorado. Family Village Cooperative Coworking and Childcare also received a $3,000 grant to defer the cost of converting to employee ownership.
The Colorado Employee Ownership Office, housed within the Colorado Office of Economic Development and International Trade awarded the Employee Ownership Grants. “These grants save businesses money as they transition to employee ownership models, so more business owners and employees across the state can realize the economic and quality-of-life benefits of employee ownership,” according to a news release from Polis’s office.
The funds offset professional costs such as accounting, business valuation and legal counsel, and represent just one funding source the Employee Ownership Office has introduced to support employee ownership transitions, the new release states. The Office also offers the Employee Ownership Tax Credit, which covers up to 50% of professional service fees necessary to become employee-owned, up to $25,000 for worker-owned cooperatives and employee ownership trusts and up to $100,000 for employee stock ownership plans, the news release states.
Polis established the Colorado Employee Ownership Office in 2020 to provide programs, funding and incentives for business owners to understand, explore and pursue employee-owned business structure, the news release states.
“I congratulate these businesses on their transition to employee ownership and am proud to continue our administration’s work to save businesses money and support employee ownership so that everyone can benefit when a business thrives,” Polis said in the news release.
The $3,000 grant to Family Village is actually a reimbursement for legal expenses the organization paid to convert to employee ownership, Melanie Hekkelman-Piazza, co-founder of Family Village Cooperative, which is located in the basement of Columbine Spiritual Center at 8900 Arapahoe Road in Boulder.
Family Village Cooperative — which originally started in Longmont in 2018 — combines all-in-one childcare, coworking and community space for parents who want a new non-traditional way to care for their children while also carving out their professional paths, Hekkleman-Piazza said recently.
“Family Village fills the gaps for young families by putting under one roof essential personal, professional and parental services that are usually kept separate,” she said.
A buyer and merchandiser for GAP Inc., Hekkelman-Piazza didn’t find fulfillment in her career. She also tended to her ailing mother and dealt with the same isolation many young parents faced that play dates alone cannot atone before she helped build Family Village.
“The problem is that parents are more isolated, overwhelmed and under-supported than ever before,” she said. “There is still a lack of support for parents even though they are seemingly more connected than ever before.”
Parents also must deal with the crippling cost of most day care facilities, Hekkelman-Piazza said. “Some parents on the edge cannot afford most daycares, which also stick to a pretty rigid schedule that can’t be bent to fit the needs of many parents,” she said.
At Family Village, parents can come in with their kids, do their work and also commessarate with other parents and compare notes. Parents can work, do yoga and also nap knowing their children are only a few feet away and being looked at by other parents or Family Village care givers, Hekkelman-Piazza said.
Family Village operates license-exempt child care facilities, which require parents to stay onsite and limits childcare to three hours per day per child. Parents retain full legal responsibility for their children while they are cared for by the facility’s full-time, professional childcare staff, who handle everything but diaper changes, according to the Family Village crowdfunding page.
Once they become a member-owner of the cooperative, parents purchase a monthly pass which grants them full access to the Family Village space during open hours. The monthly pass includes varying amounts of childcare hours for them to use at their discretion throughout the month with no scheduling required.
A one time membership fee is $25 and buys a parent a share of Family Village. A $180/month mini pass includes 12 child care hours, a $322/month mid-pass includes 30 childcare hours and a $544/month maximum pass buys 60 child care hours. Parents also have access to free coffee, tea, WiFi and discounts on fitness classes, according to the Family Village website.
Since opening in 2018, Family Village has been the “home away from home” for more than 200 families, five employees and at least eight small businesses born in that space, according to Family Village.
The facility is at maximum capacity and is looking to expand to two other locations including Longmont, Hekkelmann-Piazza said. “We really are growing and we want to return to Longmont because we have a lot of parents who are part of our cooperative,” she said.
To expand, however, the co-op has to go a non-traditional route, she said. “We fall through many traditional funding gaps, we lose out on grants, donations and government programs because we are not a nonprofit,” Hekkelman-Piazza said. “Band and investors also usually don’t give out loans to equal-ownership ventures.”
That leaves crowdfunding to get the money Family Village needs to expand. “We are really looking to the community for help,” she said.
