Breathing new life into Petaluma center

Once an object of Petaluma pride, the youth club at 8th and G streets now is outdated, scuffed and worn, underutilized and funky in the not-cool way. But not in the eyes of Deborah Dalton.

Dalton looks at the Cavanagh Recreation Center, built in 1958 as the Petaluma Boys Club, and imagines a bright and pulsating haven for children in need of a hand in many areas of life, and also an attractive option for groups looking to rent a space for meetings or events.

A brisk and driven 42-year-old mother of two, Dalton isn’t merely thinking positive thoughts about the transformation. She has devised a detailed plan and deployed her considerable persuasive powers to urge leaders of nonprofits, businesses, service clubs and foundations to sign on as active partners.

“I’ve never gotten a ‘No,’” she said during a tour of the city-owned Cavanagh Center. “I’ve gotten a ‘Maybe’ or a ‘That will be later.’ And I’ve gotten ‘Yes.’?”

Clearly, she said, “I’ve hit on something the community supports.”

Hammer-and-nails work to upgrade and restore the Cavanagh Center as a civic gem begins in earnest today.

A key volunteer in the project is Sonoma Marin Construction president Rick Young, who swam and played at the club as a kid and, as an adult, finds Dalton’s passion and her vision for the aged landmark’s new mission irresistible.

“She’s absolutely incredible. I wish she were part of my organization,” Young said. “She’s like a magnet, drawing in people to work with her.”

A rich and diverse cast of players is pitching in with Stage 1 of the renovation of the Cavanagh Center, named for late Petaluma civic leader John “Jack” Cavanagh. Soon, eight partnering nonprofit agencies will move in, then they’ll begin welcoming vulnerable children and offering them the attractions of a rec center plus myriad services intended to strengthen and better their lives.

“It’s very exciting,” said Marilyn Segal, who directs the Petaluma Community Foundation and considers Dalton “a star.” Segal and the foundation helped Dalton unite the alliance of organizations collaborating on the Cavanagh project. In addition, the foundation heads up a campaign dubbed Stronger Together to raise money for the effort.

“The Cavanagh Center will be a hub,” Segal said. At a time when some Sonoma County people complain that a multitude of nonprofits compete with each other or duplicate services, she said, the new alliance at the old club will offer youngsters and teens in jeopardy of falling through the cracks or into gangs “a comprehensive, well-coordinated package of services and programs to successfully support them and their families through a variety of challenges.”

Also on board in the re-creation of the rec center is Rebuilding Together of Petaluma, whose primary mission is to make repairs to the homes of low-income people. Led by Jane Hamilton, it is recruiting volunteers to help with the painting, the tearing out and reconstruction, carpet-laying and other tasks.

Hamilton said that in addition to being a visionary, Dalton is a supreme networker.

“She has the ability to get out and pull people in who are competent and can get things done,” Hamilton said. “She’s perfect for the job.”

Though orchestrating the rebirth of the Cavanagh Center is pretty much a full-time pursuit, it’s only the most pressing aspect of Dalton’s position as the chief executive - for just the past two years - of the nonprofit Mentor Me Petaluma.

Founded in 2000, Mentor Me links adult role models with Petaluma-area students whose difficulties at home, at school and perhaps on the streets place them in peril of failing in their studies and finding themselves in serious trouble.

Dalton, an English graduate of Sonoma State University and a former medical-services grant writer, signed up as a volunteer mentor in 2006. Since then, she said, “I have done every single job in the organization, both paid and unpaid.” She took over as chief upon the retirement of predecessor Val Richman in August 2012.

Throughout its 14 years of existence, Mentor Me has worked with students mostly at the partnering schools, which currently number 14. The agency rents office space in downtown Petaluma but has no place of its own to engage and work with the many kids who’ve been connected with mentors. Currently there are 287 youngsters in the program, and 79 on a waiting list.

Before Richman retired, she conceived the notion to strike a deal with Petaluma officials for Mentor Me to occupy the run-down and lightly used Cavanagh building, which became a financial liability to the city after its purchase from a Boys & Girls Club in 2006.

Dalton ran with the idea. “I did 18 months of homework on how this is going to work,” she said.

Mentor Me will pay the city $1 a year to use the building, and will be responsible for its renovation and upkeep. Mentor Me will generate funds for its program by renting out the large basketball gym, envisioned commercial kitchen and other portions of the building for meetings and events, and it will partner with other nonprofits in offering a range of services and activities to young people in need of help.

The pool at the Cavanagh Center will continue to be leased by a swim school, but Dalton hopes that kids involved in the various programs may be able to swim, too.

She and Mentor Me’s partners envision the offerings at the reborn center to include homework help and tutoring, leadership training, approaches to delinquency prevention, therapeutic counseling, cooking and nutrition instruction, garden and recycling projects, arts and shop crafts.

Among the partners are the gang prevention program of Sunny Hills Services, Boys & Girls Clubs of Marin & Southern Sonoma County, ?North Bay Children’s Center, which works to help children succeed at ?school; the Free Bookmobile of Sonoma County and Daily Acts, creator of the largely edible landscaping around the Cavanagh Center.

Dalton believes the old rec center’s transformation into a comprehensive, nonprofit treasure for kids at risk could become a model. “We can do this to other historic community buildings,” she said.

As intent as she is to remake the Cavanagh Center, she vowed that she and Mentor Me’s partners will not change everything.

“I want to keep the historical elements of this building,” she said. They include the sign above the front doors that honors the late Jack Cavanagh, who did much to advocate for Petaluma children and families through his 32 years on the City Council.

“We will leave that sign up and put our sign right above it,” Dalton said.

Chris Smith is at 707-521-5211 and chris.smith@pressdemocrat.com.