April 5 ground-breaking event slated for Boys |amp| Girls Club

The Boys & Girls Club of Springfield will have a ground-breaking ceremony at 4 p.m. April 5 for its William T. Stal-naker Unit in Smith Park at Fremont and Division. Morelock-Ross is the general contractor for the project and Slone Architects designed it.

The $4 million, 39,000-square-foot facility is named for Bill Stalnaker, former executive director of Boys & Girls Club of Springfield.

The new facility will have space for technology programs, the arts, tutoring, teen programming, sports and recreation, and a full-size industrial kitchen. The administrative offices for Boys & Girls Club also will be located in the Stalnaker Unit. The club will be able to serve 225 young people each day, and it will be able to extend its geographical reach in the community's neighborhoods.

The facility will replace the organization's Kynion Unit at Fremont and Division streets. The club's other locations are at 1300 Boonville, 720 S. Park and 1381 E. Division. Overall, the club provides programs for more than 2,500 girls and boys in the areas of drug and alcohol prevention, delinquency intervention, health and fitness, career exploration, educational enhancements, the arts and social recreation.