After spending 15 years moving from one leased location to the next, Doris’s Place – a branch of the relief nursery, Family Building Blocks (FBB) – has a permanent and much larger home.
“It was a $4.4 million project we raised the funds for in less than two years,” Executive Director Patrice Altenhofen said. “We opened debt-free thanks to several last-minute match donations.”
Massive in size compared to the original 2010 location, the new multi-story building on East Santiam Street includes not only five full-sized classrooms, but a food pantry, a clothing closet, a kitchen, a reception area and an entire floor devoted to the support of staff and volunteers.
“We built it as big as we could so we could offer as much quality early childhood education space as possible,” Altenhofen said.
Doris’s Place not only serves the community of Stayton but also those living as far away as Idanha to the east and Aumsville to the west.
“We serve 37 to 45 families with home visiting services,” Tanya Hamilton, FBB’s Therapeutic Early Childhood Program Director, said. “That’s why we want to make sure we have someone real strong in the position of family engagement.”
Unlike a typical preschool FBB provides support for entire families.
“Children look up to their parents and caregivers,” Hamilton explained. “So, if you want to help those kids, you have to help the people they look up to.”
FBB does this through home visits, parenting education courses, family mental health services and therapeutic classrooms where 32 children (an increase from 16) ages six weeks to five years are provided a safe environment that nurtures healthy development and healing from trauma. The FBB mission recognizes that it is in the first five years of life children require the most support.
“From prenatal to age three 80 percent of a child is developed,” Hamilton explained. “By age five, that’s 90 percent. So, if you want the best investment into the future, investing early is where it’s at.”
But FBB cannot do it all, which is why the family support piece is so crucial. That’s where the five-person staff of Doris’s Place (soon to be eight) aim to help.
“Our goal is to alleviate stressors so families can focus on attachment,” Hamilton said.
“It’s important to our board to serve people close to where they live…” Altenhofen added. “Now, many families should be able to walk to our site.”
And into the newly built reception area.
“We didn’t have a receptionist before,” FBB employee Dawn Hill said at the opening celebration on Jan. 15. “Now people are showing up in the space… and I feel really grateful.”
She also shared feeling amazed that this project, which required the FBB team to raise more than $4 million in a small community, received so much support.
“At the first recruitment event… person after person said, ‘We’re so excited. How can we help?’” Hill recalled.
And then the donations poured in, from major supporters like the Doris J Wipper Fund, the Larry and Jeanette Epping Family Foundation and Ted and Diane Freres, and from individuals as well.
“There were so many community funders…and we’re so grateful…” Altenhofen said in her welcoming speech. “But I also want to thank the staff…who make sure the meals are prepped and the children are loved.”
To learn more, visit familybuildingblocks.org/location/doriss-place/.
