ALLENTOWN, Pa. – Nonprofit community resource center Casa Guadalupe will get a new technology and arts building, thanks in part to state funding, the organization announced Monday.
Under state budget appropriations, Casa Guadalupe will get $311,000 to use towards developing a new technology, science and arts education center in the residential building next door, which the organization recently purchased.
- Casa Guadalupe, a nonprofit community resource center, plans to turn a nearby building into a new technology, science and arts education facility
- The facility will be dedicated to outgoing state Sen. Pat Browne, and will be called the Sen. Patrick Browne Arts and Technology Center
- Browne, as chair of the state Senate's appropriations committee, played a role in the state providing $311,000 towards the center's renovation
It will transform the building at 230 N. 2nd St., Allentown, into a new facility that “will help prepare students for 21st century employment opportunities,” officials said.
Casa Guadalupe offers various health, education and social services to all ages, primarily those in the Lehigh Valley’s Latino community.
Casa Executive Director Lucy DeLabar said the full renovation likely will cost about $1 million, but the organization is likely to pursue that in phases over time. It already has begun to use the property for its green space and as a meeting location.
DeLabar said Casa hopes to start using the space for education work by the end of this year or early next year.
“I think for children in this community, that lack the resources at home that many don't have, even sometimes like even food, let alone clothing or anything else, to bring something to their neighborhood that would enhance their education, and show them what they could do in the future, where they could go, what careers they could explore — that, to us, is exciting,” DeLabar said.
Andrea Wilson, Casa's education director, said the growth gives her a lot of excitement.
"These are opportunities that are absolutely necessary," Wilson said. "In light of everything that's happening around us, they stand for hope and optimism and the belief that things will still get done, and that we are still making students and their families our priorities, but in ways that are innovative.
"We need to be able to have these spaces where families and children and our students and our partners, we can come together, once more to figure things out as a collective," Wilson said.
Representatives from Casa—including DeLabar, Wilson and Casa Guadalupe board president Julio Guridy—spoke at an event Monday to announce the facility.
Guridy highlighted and invited Browne, who was in attendance and represents the district containing Allentown’s First Ward where Casa is located, to speak.
Browne also is chairman of the state Senate appropriations committee.
Honoring the outgoing state senator for his role in the funding as well as past support for the organization, the nonprofit announced the new building would be called the Sen. Patrick Browne Arts and Technology Center.
“The senator and his staff have been very open to helping us; very interested in what we're doing in helping us in this community, and in trying to get the funding that we need, not just now but also in the past,” DeLabar said.
“So as his term comes to an end, we thought this is what we can do so that people remember he didn't just start, he had been there for so many years and he has been very helpful to this community.”
“Obviously, it's always a challenge prioritizing dollars,” Browne said. “But this was something I knew was going to be very important. So I'm very happy, very happy to just continue that partnership.”
Browne, who is leaving office after losing this past year's Republican primary, said it was a great closer for his term, having held his first public event in the First Ward almost three decades earlier. He said he was very thankful to the organization for dedicating the facility in his name.
“I’m just over the moon on that,” he said. “Mainly because we've been partners for years, but to be an Allentown kid myself, having grown up here, gone to school here, raised my family here, to be honored by an organization that is making it possible for children in the next generation to have opportunities, I can't be more thrilled about that.”
"We need to be able to have these spaces where families and children and our students and our partners, we can come together, once more to figure things out as a collective."Andrea Wilson, education director at Casa Guadalupe
DeLabar pointed to the many children who took part in the nonprofit’s education programs who grew up to have good jobs in the area because of the opportunities and learning it provided. She said the building and the new programs there are going to enhance those efforts.
“The needs of the future employers, the needs of the market have changed more into technology, the arts, science and all that,” DeLabar said. “It's not enough what we've done in the past, we have to use that as a launching pad, to have these kids launch into the future, to see what's outside of their immediate community.”
DeLabar said that in addition to expanding opportunities for youth learners, the organization also hopes to start English as a second language classes for adults in the space.
