Nonprofit plans to build new facility

Community Alternative Service Program, also known as Court Alternative Sentencing Program, hopes to build a new facility in 2005 at 721 N. Main Ave. Across the street, Wehr Properties recently developed a complex for a Scrambler’s restaurant, gas station and car wash.

Construction has not yet begun, but plans are evolving, said Gaye Nickels, who took over as executive director Nov. 1.

“We would love to be in as quickly as possible, but we haven’t really set a specific date that says that we’re going to be in the building,” she said. “We still do not have a start date, we still do not have a contract, nor do we have a contractor.”

CASP has leased its offices at 943 N. Boonville for about three years, said Nickels, who leads a staff of seven. She declined to share the lease rate or owner.

CASP, a 501(c)(3) nonprofit organization, was established in 1985. “We work with the court systems in southwest Missouri to offer opportunities to folks who are given community service or probation by the courts. We help schedule them for their community service or oversee their probation,” Nickels said.

CASP assists an average of 300 clients a month.

Mark Harrell of Plaza Realty brokered the sale of the land at the corner of North Main Avenue and West Chestnut Expressway, which closed Oct. 14, for an undisclosed amount. The property was owned by One Hundred Two Glenstone Inc., the parent company of the C. Arch Bay Co., according to principal Terry Reynolds.

Jack Ball & Associates Architects PC is the architect. Travis Willson of Jack Ball & Associates Architects PC said that bids are out for the project, but a general contractor has not yet been named.

“They’re going to try to reduce the cost by $20,000 or $30,000, but nothing has been awarded at this time,” Willson said. Building plans, he said, call for administrative offices, a large conference room and two open work areas.

Nickels said that a dollar value has not yet been assigned to the project, but a building permit filed with the city of Springfield described the project as a 3,068-square-foot, one-story office building with an estimated value of $300,000.

CASP doesn’t receive federal or state funds or grant funds. “Our program is funded by the people that we supervise,” Nickels said. “We’re self-sufficient in that manner, that people pay restitution-type fees and that’s how we’re funded.”

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