Conceptual design courtesy of Rice Fergus Miller Architects

Kitsap Community Resources plans to break ground by mid-year for a new, green facility in downtown Bremerton. The nonprofit organization has received a boost of more than $2.5 million from government and private grants for the $6 million facility.

“There are still 25,000 people in the county who are living in poverty and who are still struggling to make it, and that's what this facility is about,” Sen. Patty Murray said during a visit to KCR in December to officially announce a $500,000 appropriation for the project. “The president signed (the bill) into law and I am here to tell you, the check is in the mail,” she said.

The federal money is one of many checks KCR will receive. The City of Bremerton, the state Legislature, and Kitsap County have all committed funds to the project. The agency also recently learned it was approved for a $400,000 leadership grant from the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation.

The agency planned to kick off a capital funding campaign locally at the beginning of the year. About $250,000 needs to be raised locally, and $750,000 was slated to come from private grants. With the Gates Foundation contribution, the agency needs only another $350,000 in those grants, and planned to send applications to various grant-makers.

“The (Gates) grant gives the project the credibility it needs to go to other funders,” said KCR Project Director Mike Botkin. The foundation will release $100,000 next year, with the remainder to come in when KCR raises the rest of the money. “It is in a sense a challenge grant but we're very confident we'll meet that goal,” Botkin said.

The 22,000-square-foot facility will be the first one to be built on the block that was initially purchased by the Kitsap County Consolidated Housing Authority and later transferred to the Bremerton Housing Authority. The owner of the property KCR wanted to buy, at Warren and Eighth Avenue, would only sell the entire block. The county housing authority purchased the block, allowing KCR to eventually buy its future site from the city housing agency.

“This is a nonprofit organization…that really does what they say they'll do. It's time for us to step up and help you,” Bremerton Mayor Cary Bozeman said at the December ceremony that was attended by Murray as well as local and state leaders.

Plans call for an LEED certified green building that will use water efficiency, green materials, water efficient landscaping and other features. The LEED certification is a rating system by the U.S. Green Building Council, and currently exists only for a couple new commercial buildings in Greater Kitsap.

The new center will house several services offered by KCR, including its Women, Infants and Children (WIC) clinic, commercial kitchen, employment programs, AmeriCorps, and administrative offices. Several of those services may soon be displaced due to downtown revitalization projects. KCR services are located in five buildings that include four leased ones, and it will consolidate all its services into the new facility and the second building it owns.

The agency needs the facility in order to provide a safer and more accessible environment for the 12,000-plus people it serves, as well as to make operations more efficient, said Larry Eyer, KCR executive director. The 40-year-old organization currently has challenges with limited access for disabled clients and safety issues one of its locations.

The design of the new facility is in progress, with groundbreaking expected by early summer and construction to take about a year. “We are happy to be part of Bremerton's redevelopment and be the lead project on the new block,” Eyer said.

The public campaign will go into full force around spring. Eyer said the agency is pleased with the support received at all the government levels and the Gates Foundation, but there is more work to do. “We know we still need to raise additional money so we are still working on it,” he said.

The campaign already has a good start: A leadership committee that will create a strategy to raise those funds includes Congressman Norm Dicks, Rep. Derek Kilmer, Sen. Phil Rockefeller, Mayors Cary Bozeman and Kim Abel, county Commissioner Patty Lent, and numerous local leaders.