Executives with the Center of Family Love gave Lions Club members updates on future plans, which include a major new facility that will serve hundreds of intellectually disabled people on a daily basis.

Cary Simonds and Chris Holcomb were the guest speakers at the Thursday meeting of the Kingfisher civic group.

Simonds is the director of philanthropy while Holcomb is the new senior director of business development.

“I’ve been on the job all of about seven days,” said Holcomb, a former pastor at an Oklahoma City church who said he was looking to step into non-profit work when CFL caught his attention.

“I was blown away by all that they do,” he told Lions.

The two touched on expanding the center’s business presence.

“We are really growing and need to better develop our businesses,” said Simonds.

Residents at CFL help with multiple business ventures, including an air filter shop in Kingfisher and a greenhouse on the Okarche campus.

Part of Holcomb’s job will be to “develop a system on how we can better get products directly to the consumers.”

Center of Family Love houses intellectually disabled citizens on its Okarche campus and also has homes in both Kingfisher and El Reno.

Holcomb said it costs about $15,500 per resident to house and care for them each year.

The center’s operating budget is about $9 million.

CFL receives about $6.3 million in funding, leaving a $2.7 million gap that it needs to cover through various means.

The goal? “We want to become self-sufficient,” Simonds said.

For some time, the CFL has quietly been raising funds for a new $40 million project to be built on a donated 80 acres just east of Piedmont.

The facility will not house residents like the one in Okarche, but will serve as a “day program” to further expand learning and training opportunities for the developmentally disabled.

“This will not replace Okarche. We’re not leaving Okarche,” Simonds noted. “But this will be a center where we can help take care of day program folks to the tune of 500.”

The facility will pair with a number of leaders in local industry to provide cutting-edge programming coupled with training and development.

According to literature provided by the two: “We are designing a new generation of sous chefs, veterinarian assistants, ballet teachers, artists, entrepreneurs, teacher assistants and leaders with mind-blowing abilities that will change the world forever.”

Simonds said a capital campaign for the project should kick into gear in 2024.

He said it will continue to enhance what CFL has offered residents since opening in 1981.