Centro CHA and Long Beach have spent $800,000 in grant funds to renovate a Central Long Beach building since 2022, and ended those efforts Tuesday night to pursue a new location due to rising construction costs.
Local nonprofit Centro CHA will end two years of efforts to renovate a Central Long Beach building and pursue a different location for its permanent home, after over 20 years and eight location changes wrought with uncertainty.
Centro CHA has been operating in Long Beach since 1992, providing services to the community such as citizenship and immigration services, health education, job training, workforce development, outreach and more.
The nonprofit partnered with the City in 2019 to create a workforce development center at 1858 Atlantic Ave. In April 2020, Centro CHA decided to purchase the building, and four months later Long Beach authorized a joint application with the nonprofit for the location.
The contract was amended in April 2021 so $500,000 of the purchasing money would go back to Centro CHA to offset renovation and development costs.
The city says that rising costs of construction have made renovation of the current building “cost-prohibitive,” and the City decided on Tuesday night to terminate its contract with Centro CHA, allowing them to look for a different location. During construction, the nonprofit has been located at 200 Pine Ave. in downtown.
The city had obtained $5 million in grant funds from GO-Biz for Centro CHA in 2022 to assist with construction at the building on Atlantic. As of now, $800,000 was spent on construction, design and planning at the building that Centro CHA will be leaving.
GO-Biz funds are from the Governor’s Office of Business and Economic Development.
Through those grant funds, Centro CHA will be given $400,000 to purchase a building, and the remainder of the grant which is $4.2 million will go towards renovations, preparation, space planning, construction, furniture, fixtures and equipment.
City staff said the entire process will be under its oversight and verification, though an audit from the City Auditor’s Office in March found that the City has no oversight for most of the nonprofits that lease land from the city, Centro CHA included.
Councilmember Mary Zendejas voiced her support for Centro CHA, saying she was happy to recognize “the importance of their presence in our community and how Centro CHA continues to change lives whether it’s by providing employment, a pathway to citizenship, a pathway to DACA. I’ve been so blessed to work hand in hand with you …”
Since Centro CHA and Long Beach’s contract is ending, the proceeds from the building’s sale will go back to the City. According to an audit from the City Auditor’s Office, Centro CHA was paying $53,932 annually for rent, significantly more than any other nonprofit leasing land from the City.
Centro CHA’s new building will be purchased under a restrictive covenant, so along with the services the nonprofit already provides, it must serve as a workforce development center for a minimum of 20 years.
“This is a special day for us, to be able to have this partnership with our city, to really be on this journey together,” Jessica Quintana, executive director of Centro CHA said. “I think what people don’t understand is that this has been a true journey. We have been displaced eight times so I don’t know of any other organization who has had to move their whole operations eight times in the city, but we have.”
