photo by: Austin Hornbostel/Journal-World

Lori Alvarado, the CEO of DCCCA, speaks during a ribbon cutting event for the agency's new service center at 1739 E. 23rd St.

One of the largest nonprofit agencies in Lawrence will soon be able to say nearly every one of its wide array of services is operating under one roof.

That’s because DCCCA’s new $7 million, 17,000-square-foot service center at 1739 E. 23rd St. in eastern Lawrence is now complete. Nonprofit leaders, board members and representatives with Bartlett & West and BHS Construction unveiled the space at a grand opening celebration Wednesday afternoon.

“What you see behind us is 16 months of actual building, but literally it’s 10 years of planning,” Lori Alvarado, the CEO of DCCCA, told guests at the event. “… Today represents DCCCA’s ability to leverage all of its services — behavioral health outpatient clinic, our prevention and traffic safety education and training, our child placing agency that supports foster parents, and our family preservation services — all into one location, allowing us more holistically to serve clients, families and communities all with the goal of improving lives.”

photo by: Austin Hornbostel/Journal-World

Guests mingle outside of DCCCA’s new service center at 1739 E. 23rd St. Wednesday, Nov. 15, 2023. The building will consolidate various DCCCA services that are currently spread across a few other buildings around Lawrence.

Until now, those services were spread across locations as close as an existing DCCCA facility on the same property — the 1950s-era school building that used to be home to India Elementary School — and as far away as Oread Drive in west Lawrence.

DCCCA filed plans for the building in March 2022 and broke ground about four months later in July. At that time, Alvarado told the Journal-World that she was hopeful the project would be complete in time for DCCCA’s 50th anniversary in 2024, and that goal is now a reality.

“Our roots run deep here — we’ve been here for 50 years, and we’re excited to remain in our current neighborhood and to engage with those who seek recovery, those who are looking to prevent substance abuse, those who are wanting connection and stability and hope,” Alvarado said.

Russ Harding, DCCCA’s chief operating officer, gave the Journal-World a tour of the space. The inside of the building is loosely separated into sections that will house those various programs, including a behavioral health wing with six therapist offices and areas for the agency’s community-based prevention programs, which are focused on educating people about how to address and prevent addiction.

photo by: Austin Hornbostel/Journal-World

One room in DCCCA’s new service center is intended to be a collaborative space for folks participating in the agency’s community-based addiction prevention programs.

Other spaces include a set of 25-person “group rooms,” which Harding said could host groups taking part in the agency’s drug and alcohol addiction treatment program.

photo by: Austin Hornbostel/Journal-World

Two “group rooms” at DCCCA’s new service center at 1739 E. 23rd St. will serve as spaces for groups taking part in the agency’s drug and alcohol addiction treatment program.

“That’s the ultimate goal is to help more people with their addictions,” Harding said.

There’s also a large open area in the center of it all filled with cubicles, which is where DCCCA’s foster and adoption placement staff will be stationed. They’ll also have access to “huddle rooms” that are soundproofed and allow for more privacy and other shared office spaces.

Harding said from here, DCCCA’s behavioral health and community-based prevention programs will begin moving into the new space in December, and the child placement agency staff will move in after the start of the new year.

One room in the building is already in use — a 50-person conference room that Alvarado previously told the Journal-World DCCCA plans to make available to the public when possible.

“We’re very excited,” Harding said. “I’m very excited about what (the building) has for Lawrence and the surrounding community as well, to utilize this building.”

In addition to its new facility and existing facilities and headquarters in Lawrence, DCCCA has offices in various other communities — Hays, Mission, Pittsburg, Pratt, Topeka, Wichita, Winfield and Edmond, Oklahoma. The agency has also facilitated a robust program for distributing the overdose-reversing drug naloxone across the state.