What: A summer day camp for low-income families is now accepting registration. When: The summer day camp runs five days a week from 7:30 a.m. to 5:30 p.m. for nine weeks from June 13 to Aug. 12.
Where: The Pigeon Community Center on Pigeon Street (U.S. 276) located half a mile from Main Street in Waynesville.
Who: For up to 30 children ages 5 though 15
How much: The cost is $135 for the entire summer. The cost includes breakfast, lunch and a snack, learning programs, a computer lab, crafts, games and fieldtrips. To register, stop by the Pigeon Community Center between 10 a.m. and 12:30 p.m. and 3 p.m. and 5:30 p.m. For more information call 828.452.7232.

The Waynesville community has rallied behind a summer day camp for children of low-income families after a grant that has funded the program for the last two years failed to come through.

“The idea was to serve the community for the people in the lower-income bracket, people who cannot afford these expensive camps for the summer. We try to make them affordable for working parents and single parents,” said Evelyn Roberts, who is overseeing the summer program. “I was so determined to get it going. I thought somehow we have go to get this program up.”

Private and public donations have poured in to cover basic expenses of the program, which is held at the Pigeon Community Center, a former elementary school on the outskirts of downtown Waynesville. Meanwhile, community members have stepped forward to do special programs for the kids. Dentist Mike Gillespie has signed up to do a program on what it’s like to be a dentist. The owner of Hardwood Gallery on Main Street will do a carving demonstration with the kids.

The affordability of the program is probably one reason for its popularity. The program is only $135 per child for the entire nine-weeks program. There are two paid staff, but a team of volunteers — mostly senior citizens from the community — make the program possible.

“It’s rewarding for the volunteers, who get to see that the children have a safe place to go and they are getting healthy meals when their parents are away,” said Roberts. “There wasn’t a lot of affordable summer programs for people. One hundred dollars for a week is just too much when you are only making five, six, or seven dollars an hour. You just can’t afford it.”

The need for affordable daycare was underscored last week when an Asheville woman allegedly left her 8-year-old son in the car during her shift at a nursing home. The boy suffocated in the hot car. The woman, speaking through her defense attorney, said she had been struggling to make ends meet, while neighbors and co-workers called her a dedicated mother and good worker.

The Pigeon Community Center summer camp has educational components to keep the kids learning during summer, from math workbooks to writing.

“We have them do a journal every day. They either write in their journals or draw in their journal depending on their age,” Roberts said. There is a contest to see who can read the most books. There are six computers with Internet access for computer labs. Plus, they do music and crafts.

About $4,000 in donations has come from Blue Ridge Paper Products, Grace Episcopal Church, Haywood Pediatrics, the town of Waynesville, Haywood County commissioners, and several private individuals.

The program is still looking for monetary sponsors. It also needs volunteers to help with transportation to field trips and do special programs.

Sybil Mann, a Waynesville attorney, has been assisting with the fund-raising and volunteer drive.

“Every time we enrich the life of a child, we enrich the entire community,” Mann said. “This program will prevent the difficult choice of choosing between a job they need and the child they love.”