Kenai nonprofit seeks permit to open a therapeutic daycare on Beaver Loop Road

A Kenai nonprofit wants to turn a vacant former group home on Beaver Loop Road into a daycare for about 15 to 20 young children, including children with developmental disabilities, and the city's Planning and Zoning Commission will hold a hearing on its permit Wednesday.

Frontier Community Services plans therapeutic care for children from birth through about age 7 at 2880 Beaver Loop Road, according to its application. Don't expect it soon. The nonprofit calls the permit "an initial step in the development process" and expects to open after July 2027, once it has a state child care license and fire and safety reviews.

Child care is scarce on the Kenai Peninsula. The borough averages one licensed child care slot for every three children under 5, according to the Kenai Peninsula Economic Development District's draft economic development strategy. Planning Director Kevin Buettner recommends approving the permit, citing a district study that showed a direct impact on the economy when child care isn't available to working adults.

The building, which Frontier Community Services owns, was previously a group home and day habilitation program and is now vacant. It sits on a 1.36-acre lot zoned rural residential, where a daycare needs a conditional use permit. Neighbors include homes, a mobile home park, gravel pits to the north and undeveloped land to the east.

The only planned construction is a privacy fence around an outdoor play area on the east side. City staff expect about 40 more trips a day on Beaver Loop Road, which already carries more than 2,000 vehicles a day, and said noise from the play area would be largely indistinguishable from nearby activity, including the gravel pits. No one had commented when the staff report was written.

If approved, the permit would require annual reports to the city and a new permit for any expansion or change of use.