25 years ago: Home-based daycares triumphant after planning meeting

From the Lawrence Daily Journal-World for July 23, 1987:

Advocates of home-based daycares turned out at a recent Lawrence-Douglas County Planning Commission to protest a request from Lawrence resident Anna Laura Rusk to eliminate daycare homes in single-family residential zones. After a 20-minute presentation by Rusk, the commission had voted 8-1 to “indefinitely defer” her request without taking comments from the protesters. Objecting to what she called “Old Woman in the Shoe” operations, Rusk had spoken of her disapproval of the daycares, saying that they were commercial enterprises that didn’t belong in “quiet adult neighborhoods.” She said that larger centers in commercially-zoned areas should be used and, in a suggestion that drew gasps and laughter from the crowd, suggested that several providers could band together to use the former Dillon store at Sixth and Michigan, now vacant. Rusk added that parents who use daycare would probably be glad to pay to build larger commercial centers so that mothers could drop off their children on their way to “play bridge, golf, shop and so a few can actually work.”