LUCAS – The Lucas community will soon have a new space to call its own as the Lucas Community Center is in the final stages of completion.
For board president Bill Zirzow, the completion of the center is the finish line of a race that was both long and short.
“You’d be shocked at how fast this got cleaned up,” he said. “That’s one thing that’s beautiful about Lucas, people are willing to jump in and start working.”
The Lucas Community Center is a 7,000-square foot facility on four acres of property. It will house the Lucas Area Food Pantry, a dining and gathering area, a fellowship and banquet hall, and volleyball courts. Also planned at the facility are a restaurant and pizza parlor, meeting room, counseling room, and an outdoor recreation area.
Members of the community will have the opportunity to preview the Lucas Community Center from 11 a.m. to 2 p.m. on April 2 and from 4 to 7 p.m. on April 4. Zirzow said the sneak peek is particularly for prospective donors, with the building mostly completed save for the floors.
The fast completion time is largely thanks to an anonymous donor who has contributed close to $200,000 to the Lucas Community Center 501(c)3 charity. A number of other donors have helped contribute to the center’s $387,000 as of March 2016. The center is $63,000 away from its goal of $450,000.
Many of these donors have also since become part of the Lucas Community Center Founders Club, a special group established to fund the renovations and furnishings of the center as well as helping it become financially viable. All Founders Club donors will receive recognition on a plaque permanently displayed in the vestibule of the center.
Several years ago, Zirzow was approached with the idea of converting the abandoned Liquid building into a community center. He turned it down.
“I said I’ve got too much going on, but that sounds like a cool idea,” Zirzow said.
A couple years later, while driving through Lucas one day, the number of families and children without access to community support other than a church weighed heavy on Zirzow.
“It moved my heart thinking maybe we should look into this community center,” he recalled. “Maybe this could be a place that could celebrate what most people would consider the virtues of Christ, that selfless love from God, and the eternal perspective where your life becomes more about relationships rather than things.”
A first look at the property seemed hopeless. The building had been vacant for many years, and the outdoor space was grossly overgrown – in Zirzow’s words, it looked like “an apocalyptic wasteland.” Then came a bit of divine intervention.
“We’d taken about three steps on the property, and my wife looked down and found a tiny crucifix on the ground,” Zirzow said. “She picked it up, and we thought this could be a sign.”
Today, that crucifix hangs in a modest building that was formerly a storage shed – the center’s House of Prayer, a small non-denominational chapel open to provide space for individual or community meditation and prayer.
It’s a fitting symbol for the Lucas Community Center, where the mission is to meet the needs of the Lucas community through a commitment to sharing and reflecting the love of Christ. However, though the center is a faith-based place, Zirzow emphasized the space is more about fellowship than it is about any one religion.
“We’re trying to represent that selfless love of God, and by people physically getting together that’s the first step,” he said. “Instead of someone being at home and lonely, they can sit and have an ice cream cone watching a volleyball game and it gives them an opportunity to share and be around other people.”
Fellowship is one of three main missions of the Community Center, including needs and education. When addressing the various needs of the community, the center hopes to cover food, clothing, counseling, youth programs and elder assistance.
“We have the Lucas Area Food Pantry, but we feel there will be varied needs, such as employment or drug counseling,” Zirzow said. “We hope to have the direction to go to for the resources. By partnering with other organizations, we can make people aware of them so they can get help.”
On the education front, the center plans to provide opportunities for tutoring as well as education on general topics such as personal finance, computers and technology, or health and fitness.
“It could be just as simple as how to operate a smart phone or tutoring students after school,” Zirzow said. “Underlying all this is a gathering place, a way to bring people together.”
Following the April open house dates, Zirzow said the Lucas Community Center should be open to the public by May 1. A grand opening celebration is also being planned for June.
“Currently in Lucas, unless you’re at the church or the bar there’s really no place to gather,” Zirzow said. “Our mission is to provide a welcoming environment that offers hope and joy to enrich lives. Our mission is providing the physical space where education and fellowship can happen here.”
For more information about contributing to the Lucas Community Center, visit lucascommunitycenter.com or contact Bill Zirzow at 419-564-9943 or Bob Ditwiler at 813-918-3098.
