A Washington, D.C.-area advocacy group is relocating its headquarters to Springfield next month.
Alexandria, Va.-based Fight Colorectal Cancer Director of Communications Danielle Burgess said the nonprofit is scheduled to open to the public Sept. 9 in 2,000 square feet at the Woolworth building downtown leased for an initial three years from Tillman Redevelopment LLC for undisclosed terms.
“Over the past 10 years of the organization, technology has taken off and evolved the way that you can do advocacy and policy,” Burgess said, noting Fight CRC’s staff of eight full-time and two part-time employees works virtually across the country. “Springfield’s a community that’s very similar to a lot of communities that other patients are in.”
In Greene County, the incidence rate of colorectal cancer is 39 out of 100,000 cases, with an average of 120 a year, according to Surveillance, Epidemiology and End Results program data.
Given the low cost of living in the Springfield area, Burgess said Fight CRC would cut expenses by 50 percent with the move. Also, Anjee Davis, the organization’s president and a Springfield native, recently move back to the Queen City.
Burgess, who works out of Kansas City, said the organization has a database of nearly 25,000 volunteers, including several thousand regularly involved in policy volunteering.
During 2015, the organization had 120 meetings with congressional offices from 30 states, a 20 percent increase from 2014, and volunteers sent over thousands of emails supporting bills on cancer research and screening processes, according to
FightColorectalCancer.org. The group’s 2015 budget is $2 million, according to officials.
“We’re one of the largest national advocacy groups for colorectal cancer in the country,” Burgess said.
She said the new Fight CRC headquarters would be ready for staff Sept. 1, and the crew then would work to get the office ready for a Sept. 9-10 event expected to bring to Springfield more than 40 cancer advocates from around the nation.
