With construction on the United Learning Center (ULC) moving swiftfully along and nearing completion, the Centralia-Chehalis Chamber of Commerce hosted a tour of the property during its Thursday morning forum.
Among the crowd was state Rep. Peter Abbarno, R-Centralia; Centralia City Councilors Sarah Althauser and Adrianna Garibay; Chehalis Mayor Tony Ketchum; United Way of Lewis County Executive Director Annie Oien; Discover! Children’s Museum Executive Director Shelby Campbell; and Centralia School District Superintendent Dr. Lisa Grant.
The forum started with a gathering at Centralia City Hall, with stakeholders giving opening remarks to the crowd of about two dozen before the group mingled over to the construction site across the street.
Community members walked around the future United Learning Center, Discover! Children’s Museum, Bezos Academy and amenities including a playground and a secondary building to house the Boys & Girls Club once funding allows. Oien said fundraising is currently underway for the second building.
Oien said during the tour that the plan for most tenants is to open for the public in early 2026, while Bezos Academy will open its doors in September 2026.
Lack of federal funding was a significant contributor to the nearly three years of delays to construction after a June 8, 2021, groundbreaking ceremony. But an influx of federal and local funding, including $1.5 million from the city budget’s general fund, $4 million from the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD), and $2 million from the state for the Boys & Girls Club and Cascade Community Health Care.
Oien said United Way has currently been reimbursed for $2.5 million of the $4 million in HUD funding. She thanked the elected officials, namely Abbarno and the city council, for fighting for the project and not giving up on it through its delays with the COVID-19 pandemic, federal funding struggles, National Environmental Policy Act approval, and other hiccups.
“At the core, it just draws us back to the power of responding to people in the place of their deepest need. That United Learning Center is set up specifically to do that,” Oien said. “We are responding to families in places of their deepest need.”
The ULC, according to its website, will facilitate the comprehensive education of the community’s youth through the founding entities’ combined skills, resources and connections. Stakeholders aim to create a high-quality, affordable early learning program for working families, an afterschool mentorship program and summer engagement opportunities through the Boys & Girls Club of Lewis County, and the Discover! Children’s Museum, which will ignite the love of learning in children of all ages.
Oien said the primary community that United Way of Lewis County seeks to serve is the ALICE community — which stands for Asset Limited, Income Constrained, Employed — and that Bezos Academy understands the need to support that demographic.
“We do have subsidized early learning centers that are provided through Head Start and Early Childhood Education and Assistance Program (ECAP). The really incredible thing about the Bezos Academy is that they recognize the population, the people of our community,” Oien said. “Bezos recognizes ALICE, and they step in to see how high the cost of childcare is and they respond by providing tuition-free childcare to ALICE families. That’s where this early learning center aligns so well with the mission of United Way.”
Abbarno said Lewis County is a “childcare desert” and that the project will allow local children to have a safe place to go before or after school. He told a story of how he became a father 14 years ago and how his family was in the ALICE category in 2011, as he had to bring his daughter to night classes at Centralia College and to court due to a lack of daycare options.
“I didn’t make a lot of money. I just started working here. We had our child. My wife was waitressing at Country Cousin and taking night classes to become a teacher,” Abbarno said. “I remember sitting at the kitchen table and having these tough, tearful discussions about who gives up their dream. How would we pay for daycare? Like a lot of ALICE [families], we made too much to have any meaningful relief for childcare, but we didn’t make enough to actually pay for childcare. That was 14 years ago, and we’re still experiencing that today. We don’t have the relief [in Lewis County], and this helps do that.”
Abbarno said the ULC project will be not just a difference-maker in the community but also set an example statewide.
“I think that this is going to set up our community for real success. This will help get kids kindergarten ready and also help K-12 because it helps our school districts have kids there ready to learn on day one,” he said.
