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The child development and parent support organization is using federal funds, channeled through the city of Springfield, to buy the property. Relief Nursery plans to expand its existing children and family resource center.
A nonprofit organization that works to prevent child abuse and neglect through early intervention is purchasing land in Springfield to expand its services.
Relief Nursery provides early childhood therapeutic and family support services. The organization started in Eugene in 1976 and established its Robin Jaqua Child and Family Center in Springfield in 2012.
“We’re excited about the prospect of expanding our facility and expanding our services to reach more families in Springfield,” said Kelly Sutherland, Relief Nursery’s executive director.
She said as the need for the group’s services continued to grow, Relief Nursery applied to the city of Springfield for federal community development block grant funding in 2023 to purchase undeveloped property north of its existing center.
That year, the Springfield City Council awarded the organization up to $200,000 to buy the land at 810 S. 42nd St., pending an environmental assessment.
Following a recently completed environmental review, the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development, which issues the funding, granted approval to the city to use the funds to help Relief Nursery purchase of the land, city records show.
Sutherland said the new building will have classroom space and offices, with a play area outside. Relief Nursery will start a capital campaign to raise funds to build the facility after the property sale is final.
According to the city, once Relief Nursery acquires the site, it has five years to develop a child and family resource center that will serve primarily low-income children and families. Sutherland said the organization’s goal is “to raise the funds as quickly as possible and start construction on the facility.”
“We desperately need the space,” she said.
Sutherland said Relief Nursery is grateful for the support from the city. The federal grant will go completely toward the purchase of the half-acre property, and the organization will need to raise about $3 million for construction and architectural costs, she said. Relief Nursery plans to apply for support for new construction through the state’s Child Care Infrastructure Fund.
Relief Nursery services
The organization provides wraparound services for low-income children from birth to 5 years old and their families. The centers in Eugene and Springfield have Therapeutic Early Childhood Program classrooms, which focus on promoting social-emotional development for young children. Relief Nursery teachers also visit families at home to provide support and connect them with community resources.
“We support the parents in all of our programs in addition to the children,” Sutherland said.
The nonprofit provides a range of additional services including respite child care, parenting education, mental health counseling, child development specialists and support for substance use disorder recovery. Sutherland said the organization provides transportation to classes at Relief Nursery, as well as child care and a meal, “with the idea of breaking down the barriers for the parents to access the services.”
Relief Nursery also addresses food insecurity by being a supplemental food pantry for Food for Lane County in Eugene and Springfield. The nonprofit also takes food boxes to home visits and provides breakfast and lunch to the children in the classroom program.
Sutherland said all the services are free for families, who qualify if they are experiencing at least five stressors, such as mental health challenges, substance use and domestic violence.
“There’s a lot of trauma that the children have been living through or exposed to, and so our main goal is to support their social-emotional development and then work with the parents to sort of build on their resiliency,” she said.
What are community development block grants?
Community development block grants are federal funds administered at the local level by city staff. They are intended to address community development and affordable housing needs, benefiting low-income people in the community, according to the city of Springfield.
Springfield chooses projects for community development block grant funds that meet at least one of the three national program objectives: benefits low- and moderate-income people; prevents or eliminates slums and blight; and meets an urgent need posing a serious and immediate threat to the health or welfare of the community where other financial resources are not available.