East Bluff Community Center Executive Director Kari Jones sees a potential $25,000 grant as a benefit for the entire Peoria area.
Jones is courting support to help the EBCC win one of this year’s 40 grant awards in the State Farm Neighborhood Assist program.
“What we're really hoping for is that the community will rally behind the East Bluff Community Center’s cause because we all understand that every neighborhood in Peoria is important whether or not you have a deep connection to the East Bluff,” said Jones. “If we build up this neighborhood, we're building up the city and the region as a whole.”
Jones said the East Bluff has lost many services in recent years and the EBCC aims to fill the void. She said the grant money would go toward funding improvements to their century-old former school building.
“We are looking to do some renovations and repairs in the building to make it more functional for the services and programming that are offered here, or can be offered here if certain transformations are made,” said Jones. “We also just want it to be a more welcoming and vibrant place for the families and the youth in the neighborhood, so that they feel more attracted and more at home when they come to see the things that are going on here.”
Jones said the center is collaborating with its building partners to determine what the greatest needs are. She said the goal is to make the facility more functional.
“That's going to take the form of transforming some classrooms into more specific purposes, like one is going to be more of a lounge space that will be good for youth mentoring activities or youth gatherings, small gatherings,” she said.
The application process for the Neighborhood Assist began in May, and EBCC was included among the 200 finalists out of 2,000 initial entries.
“They want you to explain how your work is truly making an impact in a neighborhood in a community,” said Jones. “So we were able to detail the sorts of things that have been going on at the East Bluff Community Center since the time of our inception. We're coming up on 10 years pretty soon here, and little by little we've been growing into more of an impact in the neighborhood by bringing in more services.”
Winners will be chosen through online public voting that starts Wednesday and continues through Aug. 27. The EBCC entry is titled “Community Center for Neighborhood Revitalization.” People can vote up to 10 times each day at www.neighborhoodassist.com; a link to the contest page also is available at the top of the EBCC’s website www.eastbluffcommunitycenter.org.
“We really appreciate all the community support we can get because, like I said, this will be a win not just for the East Bluff Community Center, but for the entire Peoria community and region,” Jones said.
