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Home > Blogs > West Chester News and Issues > Archives > 2008 > September > 26 > Entry
From ‘extinction’ to expansion
WEST CHESTER TWP. — Less than two months before Partners in Prime leaders said their satellite centers would be forced to shutter their doors if they lost a key contract, the agency’s chief officer sent a letter to trustees here requesting support for an expansion.
On Aug. 21, Partners in Prime lost a multimillion-dollar contract to control intake and assessment services for Butler County seniors to Hamilton-based LifeSpan Inc. In the weeks leading up to that decision, Partners in Prime Executive Director Stephen Schnabl said “the loss of this contract would mean that our organization and these other senior centers could face extinction in the next five years.”
But in a June 25 letter, Schnabl told West Chester Twp. Administrator Judi Boyko that it was the organization’s desire to move its current facility, a 3,000-square-foot space off Cox Road, to the nearly 16,000-square-foot library, also on Cox Road, when the township moves it to a new building late next year.
(See the letter and the rest of the story by clicking below)
The letter indicated the decision to expand in West Chester Twp. — a key area of growth for Partners in Prime, Schnabl said — had been ongoing at least one year. The agency’s Board of Directors made the recommendation to go after the current library earlier this summer.
“It’s not imminent,” Schnabl said Friday, Sept. 26, of Partners in Prime’s aforementioned demise. “And I see the growth in West Chester as one of the important steps to take so that we are in existence in the future.”
Schnabl said when his agency opened their current West Chester space in 2000 “we weren’t satisfied with that location.”
And although he said obtaining enough capital for turning a used library into a senior center would be difficult, he said there is enough money in the agency’s base operating budget for a new site.
“In any plan, we’re aware of the value of that community support, and we may see a one-time bump,” Schnabl said.
The costs for changing uses of the current library are not known at this point, and Schnabl said “worst case is, it’s able to be used as delivered.”
Trustees said on Tuesday, Sept. 23, that they would solicit input from the public on the best uses for the library before making any decisions, although all three said they would support a satellite senior center, and possibly other uses there.
Dates for public forums are expected to be announced in October, and a final decision isn’t expected until later this year.
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