Non-profit may have to move
4:32 p.m. Wednesday, October 8, 2008
The 501 district will spend $2.25 million over the next ten years to buy 128 acres at 1-70 and MacVicar. It plans to create an environmental education center sometime in the future.
Director Kelly Stephens shows us around the Prairie Advocacy Center. The agency is a non-profit center that helps victims of child abuse tell their stories to law enforcement. She says the agency has the perfect set up in order to reduce the trauma children suffer when they are being interviewed.
This specialized equipment even allows kids to draw their abuse and then have the evidence printed out for court.
"Our facility has to be set up a certain way. We need the privacy. We need the interview rooms. We need the soundproofing in a building," said Stephens.
But Kelly fears the agency could be forced to find a new place to set up shop.
This week, the Topeka 501 school district announced it's buying this land, and we found the deal could include this building. When we asked, a 501 spokesman told us the district hasn't decided ultimately what it will do with the building, and whether Stephens and the Advocacy Center can stay.
Stephens says she doesn't know if the agency could find another place to rent for the $800 a month they pay here now.
"Are we going to have to take out of our budget what we have budgeted for services for child victims in this community just to pay more rent?" she asked.
It could be a year before 501 makes a decision on whether to keep renting out that building.
Related story: Land purchase will go toward green campus
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