Children's Village expanding to keep up with the growing need of service in Yakima

YAKIMA -- Children's Village CEO Laura Crooks says with the the way Yakima is growing, their patient list is growing every year, and they want to be able to help out every one of them.

"As soon as we can get in, the better, the better they can get treatment and the more they can continue on being just kids," Crooks said.

For kids with developmental issues such as autism, children's village is the only place close by Yakima that can give them the health care that they need.

As of now, the current demand is exceeding the amount of resources they have available,

"for example in our therapy services we have over 615 children right now waiting to get in to see us and we just don't have the room to get in to see all those children right now," Crooks said.

In July, they completed a big part of their expansion on the building which included a room with a one sided window where parents can watch what therapists do with their kids so they can do the same at home.

It also included classrooms and gym rooms for therapy.

Crooks says this will probably be the last expansion for children's village because in addition, they are partnering with health providers outside of Yakima in surrounding communities.

"Three years ago we saw about 6,000 kids and we had about 20,000 visits and this last year we saw over 9,000 children and provided over 40,000 visits in one year here at Children's Village," Crooks said.

Expanding services and exam rooms will allow patients to stay close to home instead of driving to places like Seattle.

"Sometimes they're only 15 or 30 minute appointments that they have to drive two and a half hours one way and then two and a half hours back with a child with special health care needs," Crooks said.

Yakima memorial foundation is a non-profit organization that helps get donations to keep children's village running.

In 2019, they launched this expansion campaign to be able to keep up with the growing demand.

The latest donation they received was for $80,000 from Yakima Federal.

"we've had a lot of people stepping up for this campaign and it's a 15 million dollar campaign and so far we've raised a little over 8 million," Memorial Foundation CEO, Erin Black, said.

To continue reaching their goals, the Memorial Foundation is celebrating Children's Village 25 year anniversary by having a dinner-auction this Friday.

The money raised will go towards programs and services at Children's Village.

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