Community youth center near completion

The plans to build a neighborhood community center just north of Columbia College are back on track.

Three nonprofit organizations are collaborating to finish the long-awaited community center at 900 Range Line St.

Dubbed The Community Resource Center, it will offer art education for community members with an emphasis on Columbia’s youth, said Marquis Davis, the executive director of Progressive Artists Inc.

Davis’ group is working with the North Central Columbia Neighborhood Association and Central Missouri Counties’ Human Development Corporation to revive the project, which had been stalled due to funding shortages and bureaucratic holdups.

“We needed a centralized public facility in this area for a long time,” said John Clark, the president of NCCNA. He said the group sees a need for the center because the area doesn’t have anything like it within walking distance.

Beside the community center project, Davis said his organization is planning to build other facilities to offer film production programs and a recording studio for youth.

He said that along with the new community center, they will help young people get involved in positive activities.

“The initial idea came from the belief that a lot of low-income youth in the community find themselves in legal situations, like teenage pregnancy and violence, because of lack of resources,” Davis said.

Lisa Smith, a mother of three who lives nearby, said more activities for young people would help prevent delinquency.

“Kids around here have nothing to do,” she said. “They need activities for kids, especially during summer.”

The renovation of the building, formerly a Heibel-March Drug Store, will start around the first week of July and finish in September, Davis said.