Amid one of the worst economic slowdowns in decades, the Salvation Army says it's a "miracle" it has been able to raise $21 million and will begin construction Sept. 3 on a community center in Kapolei.

Nonprofits across Hawai'i are struggling with budget cuts and have been forced to reduce services and lay off employees as state and private money have dried up.

But what will be known as the Ray and Joan Kroc Corps Community Center has seemed blessed from the beginning.

"It's just been one miracle after another," said Salvation Army Major Phil Lum, project director for the Kapolei community center. "There were a whole bunch of miracles that took place to make this happen."

The center, in all a $130 million project, will be the largest such facility in the state and will provide the Kapolei area with much-needed programs from a state-of-the-art preschool and afterschool programs to a performing arts theater, aquatic facility and multipurpose gym and fitness center. It also is expected to result in hundreds of construction jobs, and 100 permanent positions when it opens in 2011.

Lum can rattle off a litany of miracles — starting with the fact that Honolulu got the Kroc capital and endowment grant in the first place. Major cities across the nation were vying for a chunk of the $1.6 billion windfall that Joan Kroc, wife of McDonald's hamburger king Ray Kroc, gave to the Salvation Army in 2004 to build community centers nationwide.

Competition for that money was fierce, Lum said. He knows this from experience after being on the losing end of an all-out drive to land a Kroc Community Center in Denver, where Lum was assigned at the time.

The loss was tremendously disappointing, he said.

Then Lum received a surprise. He had been selected to direct the community center project in a city that had won a grant — Honolulu, where the miracles were already on a roll.

There was the fact that Honolulu's initial grant request for $60 million was deemed inadequate and Honolulu was handed $80 million instead. Later, when Honolulu asked for additional funds — making the Kapolei Community Center the most costly of any to date — the Salvation Army essentially said no problem, here's $30 million more.

DONATIONS FLOW IN

Don Horner, who chairs the Kroc Center Steering Committee, is almost at a loss for words when describing the good fortunes that have led to the plan to break ground on Sept. 3.

Almost, but not quite.

"It's clearly a miracle," said Horner, the chief executive at First Hawaiian Bank. "I really don't know another word to describe it. It isn't supposed to happen like this."

For example, Horner said because Honolulu was receiving the most money, it was also obligated to raise the most money to fulfill Joan Kroc's requirement that the community demonstrate its financial support. A daunting task, right?

Not really, Horner said.

Of the $21 million raised, $4.5 million practically fell into the steering committee's lap in 2005, around the time Horner was starting to consider how to raise the money. The entire $45 million estate of Jack Lord, the late "Hawaii Five-0" star, was to be given to Hawai'i charities upon the death of his wife, Marie, which occurred that same year.

Ten percent of Lord's endowment was earmarked for the local Salvation Army. That money will now be used to build the Lord Performing Arts Center — a state-of-the-art music, dance, drama and worship auditorium that will augment the community center's education, aquatic, fitness and athletic components.

The necessary funds came in smoothly because the local donor and philanthropic community recognized an opportunity when it was staring them in the face, Horner said. The Harold K. L. Castle Foundation made a grant of $1 million. The Harry & Jeanette Weinberg Foundation Inc. gave $3 million. The Department of Hawaiian Home Lands, Kamehameha Schools, and a dozen other major charities and foundations also contributed.

"I mean, we raised more than $20 million," Horner said. "But the center is a $130 million project. That's quite an investment. And they (the donors) also fully understood that if we didn't raise $20 million, that we wouldn't get any money."

Economically the Kroc Community Center couldn't have come along at a better time — smack in the middle of the worst financial train wreck in 75 years, Horner said. He sees that as three miracles in one.

"One, it will create hundreds of construction jobs; two, the prices of construction couldn't be cheaper; and three, it will create a hundred good-paying jobs for the Leeward community."

Otherwise, some aspects of the 120,000-square-foot center have evolved neatly in place seemingly on their own.

GOOD NEIGHBORS

The proposed location of the community center has changed several times but now the 15-acre center will be across the road from the University of Hawai'i-West O'ahu campus. That campus will be built without such amenities as a gymnasium or swimming pool — making the school and the center location a marriage made in heaven for the students who can take advantage of both entities.

The center will reside at the intersection of the new North-South and East-West highways and the Honolulu rail-transit system will stop directly in front of it.

The stream of community center users will be never-ending. These things have all simply fallen in place, Horner said.

"You couldn't have planned this," he said with a laugh. "There's no way anybody can take credit for this. And the stories just keep on coming. I could go on for hours."

Salvation Army officials aren't waiting until opening day to give area children a taste of the excitement and positive experience that's coming.

"Even though the whole structure is not there yet, the Kroc Center is already involved in getting vibrant educational programs working in the community," said Daniel de Castro, public relations director for the Salvation Army's Hawaiian and Pacific Islands Division.

For instance the Kroc Ambassador Education and Outreach, a free afterschool program for children ages 7 through 17 in Waimalu and Waipahu, has been in operation for several months at different locations in Leeward O'ahu.

"By the time it's all finished, we want to have ongoing programs that would just be transferred over to the new facility," de Castro said.

That new facility should remain in place for generations of kids to come. According to Joan Kroc's instructions, a full $55 million of the gift to Honolulu must be used as an endowment to operate and maintain the center in perpetuity.

"One thing about this project is the money's all there," Lum said. "It's all cash. It's just sitting there waiting to be used. And that's a good position to be in."

Meanwhile, the money miracle hasn't extended to the Salvation Army Center in 'Aiea, which Lum manages in addition to his project duties.

"I don't have any Kroc dollars to operate the 'Aiea location," he said, momentarily returning to a world where miracles are few, and tough to come by. "All that money was earmarked specifically for the Kroc Center. And all our other programs have to find their own funding.

"Our budgets are being cut. But, we'll make do."