##VIDEO ID:2S9cW0AopuM## [Music] [Music] hello everyone and thank you thank you for tuning in uh to this special event that we have here at the new Gardener Community Center over on Waterford Street uh this is a really exciting day two years ago we had our announcement just on the other side of that wall to say that we were converting the former Waterford Street School into our new nonprofit Community Center so that our nonprofit community and Gardener can work on a more collaborative basis more close basis literally and figuratively and grow their programs that they offer to our community here and we're taking the next step in that Journey here signing the official lease document with the gardener CAC uh so they can start their work to fit out their space in the new community center this has been a long time coming and I'm really happy and excited for us to be here today uh I'd like to kick it off uh next to our city council president who played an integrant role uh with the city council on making it so that we could get this far in this project uh our city council president Elizabeth kazin good morning everyone thank you for being here today this is very exciting as the mayor had said I'd like to acknowledge my fellow counselors here today counselor d lawitz uh councelor Heath counselor Mack and counselor tyros as well here today joining us uh you know the work of the city council really is on behalf of everyone in the city that we represent and there is um you know a lot of funding sources that need to be allocated to this project uh it's really exciting to have a former School building being repurposed in a very positive way for the city directly affects everybody here in the city um so I'm really excited to be here and we are very happy to be able to support this effort and do our part as City councilors I would like to next introduce state representative John znik uh very excited uh to be here today uh for this big milestone in this uh Redevelopment project of the former Waterford Street School uh this has been a top priority of mine in the mayor's uh and um you know so this is a a very key piece of this uh the CAC uh beginning the process of moving over here I've seen to it that the state has been very financially supportive of this project uh I intend to continue that support uh and happy to announce today uh that the state is providing $100,000 to the CAC to facilitate their move and the renovations that they will need uh to make this building their home but to save this uh building from the wrecking ball I think is very important uh credit to the Nicholson Administration and the city council uh for really prioritizing uh repurposing uh or selling or reusing uh former uh school buildings and former municipal buildings I think it's a welcome change here in the city of Garder uh buildings like this if we had to rebuild uh the cost would be astronomical and we couldn't do it uh so it is important that the buildings that we can save and repurpose uh that we do that because we certainly have no shortage of Need for space in the city uh for all these programs like the CAC like growing places like the senior center uh that we expect to all inhabit this building eventually um it's going to be a good thing for all those organizations but most importantly it's going to be a great thing for the people of the city of Garder uh so I'm very happy to be playing a role uh in this project uh and very happy as always to partner with the city of Garder um and then uh the star of the show today uh the CAC I'm happy to uh welcome up their executive director Julie Mian good morning as you may have all guessed I am very happy and excited to be here today um when I first got the phone call in the email that the CAC was available for our Le our lease signing it was ready to go the first thing that came to mind was a quote from Neil AR Armstrong which sounds weird because we're relocating to Waterford Street not to the Moon um but one small snap for man one giant leap for mankind and for us at the CAC this is such a transformative step for us in our ability to connect with the community to serve the community and to most importantly to impact the community so just to touch on a few of our programs that we have um most of us know us as food Security Programs and Garder and I am proud to say that we've increased our capacity by 63% over the past 2 years in October alone we have over 1,000 people that came to our office just for the food pantry for food um our fellowship table continues to serve a free meal each Thursday the senior Cafe continues to grow our numbers um and those are just our food Security Programs on top of our food Security Programs our backpack program coing closet Thanksgiving and Christmas food baskets holiday gifts for children ages newborn to 12 the help connection emergency assistance and the clothing CET have all increased our capacity and the number of people that we're serving each week um I just want to say as I started with we are all so excited from everybody in our staff our board of directors and all of our volunteers are so excited to be moving here to increase our capacity our ability to serve the community The increased accessibility and the impact that we can make in Garder so thank you to the city of Gardner mayor Nicholson state representative John znik all of our city councilors the Community Foundation of North Central Mass Community Foundation of the health Foundation of Central Mass in the United Way so thank you so much for helping take our agency into the next step and start our new chapter thank you and I'd like to finally introduce our board president Ruben [Applause] Cabrera well thank you so much for being here today at this special moment thank you to Mayor Nicholson state representative snik city council uh those of you here from the community uh to share in this moment with us I've been on the board of the CAC for 5 years uh my terms or term will end uh this coming June and quite honestly I was beginning to doubt whether or not this would happen uh it just seems that every time we turned around there was a little delay or a little push or whatever but uh to be able to stand here today and to uh celebrate this moment with you and with uh my fellow board members of the CAC uh is just a great honor at the uh church that I serve here in Gardner Bethany Baptist Church uh we are in the midst of a series uh on values and it just so happens that the value we're going to be talking about this Sunday is the value of building authentic Community creating authentic connections amongst people and in our church and in our community with our community so that we can be what God wants us to be and accomplish the things he wants us to accomplish one of the things that happens in Garder that I see so often having moved here a little more than six years ago is that the city creates places where authentic Community can happen a number of years ago the city made available the facility on Pleasant Street where we are currently uh housed and will soon come over here uh uh and begin to do the work that uh that that we have been doing um and uh we're excited about that because both of these things have created open doors for people in our community to come and experience Community uh to practice one anothering caring for one another supporting one another encouraging one another and so uh to be able to be here today and to be a part of this is a great joy for me um one of the things you may have noticed about uh our world today particularly those of you who may be in real real estate is that um when people build houses today rarely if ever do they put a front porch on uh if there's any entertainment space or public space or community space it tends to be in the back where it's safe where we don't have to interact with people uh as I view uh this facility and the things that are going to happen here not only with the CAC but growing places in the senior center and uh all just I view this as as a front porch as a place where our community can come together and meet the each other's needs do that one anothering that needs to happen and so on behalf of the board and on behalf of the people of this community thank you so much for making this available thank you so much for what will happen here in the coming years uh in closing let me just say a word with regard to Julie uh Julie is a treasure to us Julie and the staff at the CAC work so hard and are so diligent in the things that they are called to in in our city and uh this really would not be happening uh at least from our perspective uh if Julie was not uh the director and did not uh put together the staff that she has and so we appreciate her and I want to say that in closing thank you so much again for being here and uh we look forward to all of the good things that are going to happen uh in the coming years as we serve together uh that concludes our speaking program here uh I just want to close by saying that this is something that we've made a a concerted effort to do lately in making sure that we don't become gardeners next absentee landlord but taking that even further and making it so that Garden is a place that can grow and continue to support the people who live here making sure that we don't have the next School Street School here on Waterford Street where we're looking at you know tearing down a building to open up promise and remove light that way and keeping promise alive here instead by making it so we don't get to that point uh there's a lot lot of work that we have left to do uh but for now I think we've got a uh document we need to sign so uh we're going to break sign the lease and then start the ball rolling here just for the benefit of people watching and it's important to say this too just because we're signing the lease here in the Frank Chase Memorial room that's soon to be the food pantry here at the uh Community Center the CAC is still going to be over on Pleasant Street for now until the work here is done uh so pay attention for when that move happens but for now if you need c Services continue to go over on Pleasant Street uh but let's go sign the lease thank you [Applause] it's [Applause]