‘The Center Shines On’ 40 years later; O'Hara facility serves 10,000 people a month

Inside the kitchen of a home in the Falconhurst neighborhood in the early 1980s, friends Sue Golier and Gretchen Montgomery plotted the beginning of something magnificent.

They just didn’t know it yet.

The pair discussed the need for a community center in the Fox Chapel Area, and at the same time lamented the dilapidation of the former Boyd Elementary School off Powers Run Road in O’Hara.

“On the first day of elementary school, the principal was waiting on the stoop to greet us and my mom fell in love with Boyd at that moment,” recalled Amanda Montgomery Carvelli, Gretchen’s daughter.

“When it closed after my third grade year, my mom and Sue wanted to keep that building alive. They put together a daycare and after-school classes. They made it into an actual community center and library, and the community really got behind it.”

Forty years later, the Lauri Ann West Community Center has since been rehoused into a multimillion-dollar building on the same property with myriad programs for all ages that range from Mah Jongg to pickleball to ballet to calligraphy.

“We have a fitness center, group exercise, a speaker series, wine Wednesdays, live music, children’s arts and enrichment, STEAM programs and so much more,” Director Mark Rothert said.

The center averages more than 10,000 visits per month.

The public is welcome to “Celebrate the Center” with a themed party from 7 to 10 p.m. Sept. 22. Tickets for “The Center Shines On” cost $100 per person and are available online at lauriannwestcc.org.

“We’ll honor past volunteers, staff, and community leaders who made it happen, and enjoy a night of local food and drinks and live music by Asphalt Rodeo,” Rothert said.

In all, the event will honor 44 neighbors and longtime friends of the center for their contributions.

Proceeds will support programs, and also underwrite the Sue Golier Memorial Speaker Series and the Gretchen Montgomery Children’s Scholarship Fund to honor the women who started it all back in 1983.

“She’d be tickled to see all these people come together,” said Sara Golier Schneider, Sue’s daughter.

Golier passed away in 2022 but Schneider said “she was so proud of what the center had become.”

Golier kept her out-of-state daughter updated with center happenings.

“It was always something like, ‘Do you know we have a café now?’ or whatever was new at the building,” Schneider said. “She was thrilled to have been there at the beginning when it was just a group trying to figure out which classroom to use for science or sports or reading.

“I don’t think she imagined it being something big, but she saw a need in the community.”

Likewise, Carvelli, of Fox Chapel, said she vividly recalls the two women sitting in the front offices of the old school building, “giggling while they worked.”

Montgomery now lives in South Carolina but is proud that her grandchildren use the center for dance classes, sports and other programs.

“She was in town a few years ago, and we drove by,” Carvelli said. “She was just astounded. To see it be this big 40 years later was shocking.

“I think it really got her that they came up with this, and it stuck, and now thrives.”

The center operates as a private-public partnership, supported by O’Hara. The bulk of finances are raised by paid programming.

Open 360 days a year, Rothert said the goal of the facility is “to continue to have it be the center of community.

“Our vision as a board is to unite and inspire the community,” he said.

Limited by physical space, expansion isn’t so much an option as keeping programs fresh and drawing newcomers with trendy and unique offerings.

“We have to keep up from a programming standpoint,” he said. “What worked 10 years ago isn’t what people want today.”

Pickleball courts, for example, have a wait list everyday.

“The challenge is always figuring out what’s the next new big thing,” Rothert said.

Longtime teacher Bobbie Cubbage of Blawnox started as a summer camp instructor in 2011 and served as an extra set of hands in the preschool classroom. Soon after, she took on a role with the after-school program, which has grown from 24 to more than 80 students. Cubbage leads popular classes, such as “Bigfoot Camp,” that are going on 10-years strong.

“It’s amazing to see how much the community center has grown, and it’s a beautiful thing,” Cubbage said. “From our old building that was screaming for updates to the amazing place you see today with a state-of-the-art fitness center, welcoming desk staff, a beautiful double-sized gym, an elevated running track, several classrooms, an awesome cafe area and so much more.”

Some things have remained the same over the decades, Cubbage said.

That is: community support and people’s excitement to be there.

“The families are phenomenal, and I am so proud to be a part of such an inspirational place,” she said.

Staffer Ray Killian, of Trafford, has worked at the center for 10 years.

His maintenance job has also grown from strictly cleaning to a lot more program setup, Killian said.

“It’s more than a place to take classes,” he said. “It really is a community center. In the old building, it was a lot of kids coming in for arts and crafts.

“Now it’s nonstop people coming in and out, like a train station.”