Bend’s Community Center, which closed in February, will reopen early next year with new management and free meals for seniors.

The Council on Aging of Central Oregon announced Monday it had purchased the community center building, a former church on NE Fifth Street that used to operate as the Bend Senior Center. Susan Rotella, the executive director of the Council on Aging, said the organization was excited to have more space for seniors and staff.

“What we want to do is have space for seniors to come in and get help and resources and have space to congregate,” Rotella said.

The 8,750-square-foot community center is about five times the size of the Council on Aging’s current site on Greenwood Avenue. It also has a full-size commercial kitchen, meaning the Council on Aging can start serving free meals five days a week.

The organization serves free lunches to people 60 or older three to five days a week at sites in Redmond, Prineville, Madras, Culver and La Pine. But in Bend, it’s been limited to Thursdays at the Bend Senior Center on Reed Market Road.

“We’ve always been looking for a place in Bend where we could do the five-days-a-week meal like we do in Redmond and Prineville,” Rotella said.

Many seniors in Central Oregon use the free meals as a way to augment their meager budgets, Rotella said.

“For many seniors, it is really their only access to good nutrition because of their financial situation,” Rotella said. “The other main part is about socializing and having a place to go.”

Such meal opportunities are often one of the only no-cost options seniors who have lost friends or loved ones have to socialize, Rotella said. Early plans for the new building also include a small bistro and a library/living room area where seniors can gather during the day to talk, play cards and work on puzzles, she said.

The number of seniors in Central Oregon has risen dramatically in the past few years, according to the U.S. Census Bureau. In Deschutes County, the number of residents 65 or older increased nearly 50 percent, from about 23,500 in 2010 to nearly 35,000 in 2016. Jefferson and Crook counties saw slightly smaller increases: 30 percent in Jefferson County and 33 percent in Crook County.

As baby boomers — the youngest of whom are now in their mid-50s — continue to age, those numbers are expected to increase further. The new building will provide space the Council on Aging needs to offer services to more people and fit more employees, Rotella said.

The Fifth Street building was home to the Bend Senior Center until 2001, when the Bend Senior Center on Reed Market Road opened. For 10 years, the new facility was the Council on Aging’s meal site for seniors. Then, in 2011, the Bend Park & Recreation District envisioned a facility that serves more active seniors, and the meal site was relocated to the old senior center, Bend’s Community Center. When the community center closed in February, a four-days-per-week meal program shuttered with it.

While the Council on Aging just started its design process for the community center, Rotella said, it will include conference rooms for staff to meet with clients and provide seminars, training and support for caregivers.

The group also plans to runs its Bend-based Meals on Wheels program from the site. Meals on Wheels delivers free meals to homebound seniors, and delivery drivers often visit with the meal recipients.

As the Council on Aging redesigns the community center to fit its needs, Rotella said, it wants to incorporate historical elements, including the building’s steeple. She said the organization wants to see photos of the site from the ’50s, ’60s and ’70s.

— Reporter: 541-633-2160; jshumway@bendbulletin.com