PACE — Residents of Pace could be getting a community center in the near future thanks to the Friends of the Pace Library.
Tom Twarkins, a representative of the Friends of the Pace Library private nonprofit, approached the Santa Rosa County Local Option Sales Tax committee at the June 19 meeting to ask for the community center addition to the library.
According to Twarkins, 40 percent of Santa Rosa’s population lives between Avalon Boulevard, Escambia River and Berryhill Road. He says that the number of citizens will be drastically increasing in this area with in the next few years.
“These people need public services.” Twarkins said. “And one of those services is a community center. There is no community center in this area. There is no place for assembly.”
Twarkins said that not all recreation includes a ball and bat.
“A lot of these people use the library and community groups and assembly as their recreation and they need a place.”
Pace Library was conceived in 2005 and originally included a community center in the design. However, after the devastation of Hurricane Ivan to Santa Rosa County that same year, plans were put on hold for the community center.
Twarkins said the land exists for the center and there is public demand for it.
“I have a list of over forty groups that use community centers or library centers in the county and several of them ask the Pace library for space but we have to turn them down,” he said. “We don’t have the space.”
Twarkins said Pace Chamber of Commerce has expressed an interest in using the center if it was built.
LOST Committee Chairman Ed Carson said there is a $300,000 line item that the committee was in agreement with to support the building of the facility.
Assistant County Administrator Dan Schebler said that no official design had been set forth yet for the building and that the county would be working with the a company to finalize design and move forward with the project.
This article originally appeared on Santa Rosa Press Gazette: 'We don’t have the space.'