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Hernando Today

Enrichment Center Settling Into New Home

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By TONY MARRERO Hernando Today

The Tampa Tribune

Published: February 6, 2009

BROOKSVILLE - The sound of laughter coming from the front room of the Jerome Brown Community Center on Thursday wasn't surprising.

The center, after all, was built in 2000 to give Brooksville's youngsters a place to go for sports, recreation and other activities.

But the jolly noises started around 10 a.m. Thursday, well before school would let out that day, and they surely weren't the high-pitched squeals of children.

In fact, a boisterous group of seniors were enjoying a spirited game of rummy, waiting for lunch to be served a little later on.

A new generation is enjoying the Jerome Brown Center, starting this week.

The Enrichment Center of Hernando County, a nonprofit organization that provides an array of educational and recreational activities mainly to seniors, has moved from a storefront in a Brooksville shopping plaza into the city-run Jerome Brown building. The center is located at 99 Jerome Brown Place, just west of Tom Varn Park.

It's part of a deal the enrichment center board of directors struck with the city council in December: The enrichment center will pay rent of $1,000 a month to operate in the Jerome Brown Center until renovations are complete on a building at the Quarry, the city's golf course.

The building, currently used for storage, will serve as the enrichment center's home, and also house a pro shop and possibly a museum chronicling the county's mining industry. The building also will be fortified to serve as a shelter for evacuees with special needs.

The enrichment center has $700,000 in state and county money for the project. It's still in the planning stages and likely more than year from fruition.

In the meantime, the Jerome Brown Center will do just fine, said Debbie Walker-Druzbick, the director of the enrichment center.

"It's going to work," said Walker-Druzbick. "We're very excited."

The shelter hadn't planned on moving quite so soon, Walker-Druzbick said. But conditions at nearby Brook Plaza had worsened to the point that the board worried about the safety of the visitors and volunteers.

The board claims that panhandlers frequent the area and that the center had been vandalized. The board has asked the courts to free the center from its lease, which extends to 2011. The landlord hasn't provided security as promised, according to court documents.

The enrichment centergained some and lost some, Walker-Druzbick said. The clogging classes had to go to the center's other location at Oak Hill Hospital.

"You can't clog on the gym floors," Walker-Druzbick said.

She said plans are in the works for a fitness class using the Wii Fit video game.
Enrichment center visitors and volunteers say they are getting used to their new digs.

On Wednesday, dozens showed up to play bingo, exercise and take quilting lessons in the Jerome Brown Center's gymnasium.

Youngsters don't start showing up for afterschool programs until about 3:30 p.m., so until then the gym is free.

The city also has offered another small room for a library and office space. By Thursday, all the books were in place, from "The Complete Works of Shakespeare" to a collection of Tom Clancy novels.

Alfred Schlosser, a 65-year-old Brooksville resident, calls the bingo games and said he prefers the new location.

"My voice carries a lot better" in the gym, said Schlosser.

The front recreation room is a little cramped. Seniors waiting for lunch on Thursday shuffled between tightly spaced tables and chairs. An unplugged air hockey table and folded ping pong tables sat in one corner.

"If they could move the walls a little bit," said Bob Wilson, 81, with a good-natured laugh. Wilson, of Brooksville, has been coming to the center for two years.

Bobbyie Kulaga, 76, serves food as part of the daily congregate meals program through Mid-Florida Community Services. The tight quarters is a challenge, Kulaga said as she clutched her hairnet.

"She'll get by," Robert Hatch, 67, piped in, casting a mischievous eye toward Kulaga.

"I come from a family of 16 and I had nine (children)," Kulaga shot back. "Oh, I'll get by."

Flo Leister, 82, of Brooksville said the place will do fine until the center has a permanent home.

"It's going to take some time to get used to it, but it's going to be a lot better than what we had," said Leister, who has been coming to the enrichment center for more than a decade.

There's another benefit to the location, Leister said: "They've got youngsters here."

While the scheduling of activities ensures the enrichment center doesn't interfere with youth events, there inevitably will be some encounters between the generations. That will please a lot of the older folks, Leister said.

"I think the environment is whole lot better for us," she said.

The arrangement is going well, with a few kinks to work out, said Mike Walker, the city's parks and recreation director. Walker worked with the enrichment center board and recommended the deal to the city council.

"I just love to see the facility being used," Walker said. "Now we're really touching all ages."

Reporter Tony Marrero can be contacted at 352-544-5286 or lmarrero@hernandotoday.com.

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