An illustration of what the proposed McKibbin Center would look like. CDM Caregiving Services Executive Director Eric Erickson said construction for the project should begin in July.
This summer, a groundbreaking for a new aging care resource center is set to happen, helping to better cover day services for the elderly and disabled.
CDM Caregiving Services, a local health care organization that features both in-home care and programs at the current center, announced last month they had received $250,000 from the Firstenburg Foundation as a part of its “Aging with Dignity” capital campaign. The campaign’s goal is to build a new facility for CDM with greatly expanded resources for their day services.
That goal now has a clearer target, as construction on what will be known as the McKibbin Center will begin tentatively in July, CDM Caregiving Services Executive Director Eric Erickson said. Ground will technically be broken in June for a sewer connection, with the main project work to follow.
The center is named after John McKibbin, former politician and community leader who died in a plane crash in March 2016.
The total cost for the project is almost $3.5 million, Erickson said. The organization only has to raise slightly more than $1 million to fully cover the project.
A sizeable chunk of that has been requested from the state Building Communities Fund program — $395,000 — and Erickson said that the funding was included in the Washington state House budget. Should the funding come in the final budget, he said the money would “close that gap considerably.”
Other funding came in the form of grants like those given by the Firstenburg Foundation as well as the campaign steering committee’s efforts, raising $600,000 on their own.
Making up for the rest of the funds would be a combination of fundraising events as well as a community campaign, though what form that campaign would take had not been decided yet, Erickson said. What’s left would take the form of some sort of mortgage, he added.
“We’ve struggled to provide the services we do in the building that we’re in and we’ve made it work, but to have our own building that’s really built for that purpose and to have roughly double the amount of space to serve clients is an amazing feeling,” Erickson said.
Erickson said the only other adult day services center with a Medicaid contract, Innovative Services NW’s Adult Day Health Center, had recently closed, creating a coverage hole that has made CDM’s current aging care resource program at capacity. Ordinarily the center would be handling about 25 clients a day, but recently that number has swelled to 33 daily. Given that influx the current location at 2409 Broadway St. is packed.
“We’ve got every possible office space filled and then some,” Erickson said.
The new building, set to be located in about the 2300 block of North Andresen Road, will be 9,720 square feet with 6,720 on the main level where the day services will be located, Erickson said. The expansion is greatly anticipated as caring for aging populations becomes more and more of a focus.
“The services we do are just going to keep growing and growing,” Erickson said.
