Anthony Ross has built six child care centers in the last five years and “it”™s reasonable to say I”™ll build six more.”
The Tarrytown-based managing director of Center Management Associates Inc. will open a 12,600-square-foot Children”™s Corner Learning Center at the Tarrytown Corporate Center this fall.
The 170,726-square-foot building at 580 White Plains Road is owned and managed by RXR Realty L.L.C.
“If you look at the area with all of the residential and all of the apartments, there”™s a need,” said Joel Cardillo, senior vice president of leasing at RXR Realty. “I think it is a question of where it”™s viable and where you think it”™s going to be successful. A lot of money is invested in building something like this. They probably cost in excess of $100 a foot and that”™s before tenant finishes, so it”™s very expensive.”
The Tarrytown center is Ross”™ 10th location; he is now in the process of converting a day care center on Route 9 in Wappingers Falls into a Children”™s Corner Learning Center; it will turn over on Aug. 1.
But despite his healthy ”“ and growing ”“ portfolio of properties, Ross says the concept of day care at the office park is not necessarily a new trend.
“You”™re talking to a very old-timer,” he says. “I started in 1973. There”™s no shortage of child care, but there is a shortage of affordable child care. We look for a very high-end, Class-A office building, but don”™t always go after the high-end market in child care.”
Employees at the corporate center and the general public can enroll; clients are charged on a per-month basis.
Tarrytown Corporate Center”™s Property Manager Susan Curtis said that tenants are excited.
“From our perspective, it”™s more than a tenancy,” she said. “It”™s an amenity.”
Joseph Kelleher, president of the Hutchinson Metro Center in the Bronx, which is owned by New Rochelle-based Simone Development Cos., said that the Children”™s Corner Learning Center at his complex thrives because “it”™s in kind of a protected environment.”
“It”™s obviously very convenient to have your children where you”™re working,” he said. “There”™s parking and it”™s easy for them to pull into the parking lot where there other amenities like dry cleaners and restaurants.”
At the Children”™s Corner at RPW Group”™s 1133 Westchester Ave. property in White Plains, formerly owned by IBM Corp., the landlord built a specially designed drop-off for children, Ross said.
It will be mimicked in the new Tarrytown center, but “the parking lot was adjacent to the door so it was just a matter of a new sidewalk and new doors.”
At the White Plains center, Ross says he would like to take out another 10,000 square feet for an indoor play area and before- and after-school programs.
“At 1133 next year, we”™ll be starting what we call a young camp,” Ross said. “We notice we lose about 25 to 35 percent of our enrollment in the summertime that go off to camps ”¦ we want to do something along the lines of a medium-priced camp.”
