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Bayer to construct new facility
One of Berkeley’s largest corporations recently held a groundbreaking ceremony to celebrate the acquisition of 14.5 acres and the beginning of construction of a new day care facility for its employees.
The Bayer Corporation bought the acreage located at 7th and Grayson which was formerly owned by Colgate in February and has renamed in Bayer South Property.
The Bayer Corporation has partnered with Bright Horizons, a leading provider of employer-sponsored childcare and early education and work/life consulting services, to manage the new day care facility.
“The Bayer Family Center has been greatly anticipated by our employees and will contribute to our goal of becoming an ‘Employer of Choice’ in the Bay Area,” Laura Lindsay of the Bayer Corporation said.
The 9,600 square foot facility is scheduled to open in 2001 and will serve approximately 92 children ranging in age from 6 weeks to 6 years old. The program will also care for 6 to 12 year olds during the “Schools’ Out!” program during holidays and summer vacations.
According to Laura Linsday of Bayer, the facility will include a project room, kitchen, children’s garden and a multipurpose/school age room.
“The model curriculum will include science, arts and music and the focus of the program will be to support a family approach to childcare. In other words we want to recognize parents as the most important influence in the lives of their children and want them to share in decisions affecting them.”
Bright Horizons currently manages over 325 Family Centers for more that 250 employers worldwide. According to their website the clients include 75 Fortune 500 companies and 44 that appear on Working Mother magazine’s list of the “100 Best companies for Working Mothers.
In addition to the Family Center, Bayer will be expanding their facilities to include a 3-story, 210,000 square foot production warehouse which will be used to manufacture production of Kogenate FS, a drug to treat hemophilia. Bayer will also construct a two-story, 120,000 square foot sterile fill facility.
The Bayer Corporation expansion will bring increase their total acreage to 14.5 and will create 400 new jobs.
