A significant expansion of the Bend Senior Center is moving up the list of priorities for the Bend Park & Recreation District.

At a goal-setting session last week, the park district’s board chose to accelerate the effort to build a nearly 40,000-square-foot expansion of the 14,000-square-foot senior center near the corner of SE 15th Street and Reed Market Road. Design work on the estimated $16 million project will begin later this year, according to Matt Mercer, district director of recreation, with construction likely in late 2016 or 2017.

Mercer said until last week, the district had been considering a remodel of the senior center that would add around 1,200 square feet and make minor alterations to some rooms in the current facility, with the larger expansion pushed off to the future.

With the change in direction, the district will begin planning to tackle the entire expansion at once, Mercer said. As envisioned, the larger facility would include a therapy pool, a full-size gymnasium and a variety of multipurpose rooms.

Mercer said the remodel and expansion would be a departure from the original plan for the senior center, which designated individual rooms for card games, computer classes and other predetermined uses.

“Almost since the day it opened, most spaces have functioned in a much more multipurpose way,” Mercer said.

The senior center also hosts a daily lunch for senior citizens and is home to the local Meals on Wheels program.

Michelle Healy, the district’s director of strategic planning and design, said the district plans to split the cost of the expansion between funds held in reserve and borrowing against future general fund revenue. The district used a similar financing system to expand Juniper Swim & Fitness Center in 2006, she said.

Healy said moving the senior center up the district’s priority list and tapping future general fund revenues won’t delay other district projects in the pipeline.

“Some of our general fund dollars have always been used for these kinds of things, or anticipated to be used in this way, so it’s not unique,” Healy said.

Funding indoor facilities like the senior center is a challenge for the district, Healy said, as state law bars the district from using systems development charges to pay for them.

Developers pay the district more than $6,000 in SDCs on every new home built in order to cover expansions to the park system, but the district does not have free rein to spend the money as it chooses.

Expansion of the senior center was not included in the $29 million bond measure approved by voters in 2012. The bond is being used to pay for the district’s largest indoor facility currently under construction, a covered ice rink and sports complex off Simpson Avenue in southwest Bend.

— Reporter: 541-383-0387, shammers@bendbulletin.com