Smiles have replaced frowns in the wing at White River Presbyterian Church that ACAP Child and Family Services has called home since mid-November.

That’s because ACAP’s long season of service to the Auburn community is not done as staff, supporters and parents had feared three weeks ago.

“ACAP is not dead in the water,” said Debbie Taylor-Hough, Neighborhood Outreach Director for White River Presbyterian Church. “There is great hope.”

Hope because state and city officials apparently are satisfied that the two-hour fire wall ACAP agreed to build around three of the classrooms can keep the kids safe.

To satisfy officials, ACAP has agreed for now to downsize from the original six classrooms to three and to reduce the number of kids in those rooms from 89 to 50. It also obtained a two-year extension to install an overhead sprinkler system, which had been the original sticking point with state officials.

Construction on the firewall began last weekend.

“Parents, community, the church, everybody just rallied around,” said Largo Wales, executive director of ACAP. “We started Friday night because we had to frame in the new doors. We did the first layer of sheet rock on Saturday, the second on Monday. We had the inspectors come through and inspect each step along the way. On Saturday, we had 50 people here working, probably 20 on Sunday.”

Once that work is completed, Wales expects that ACAP will obtain an occupancy permit from the city. The state fire marshall will look at the occupancy permit and inspect the firewalls and then call in the Department of Social and Health Services (DSHS) to make sure all the other pieces are in place. Then, Wales said, it should be a go.

“I think we’re in the home stretch,” Wales said.

ACAP raised $5,500 last weekend, and if it continues to receive financial help to do some of the other projects, Wales said, should be back up and running by the first of January, maybe sooner.

ACAP had to leave its home in Les Gove Park because the city needed the site for the Community Center. White River Presbyterian Church, which had been ACAP’s original home in 1970, invited it to return.

Michael Hursh, Human Services Manager for the City of Auburn, helped ACAP and White River work out the details of their agreement. He said there had been an understanding between the city and ACAP even before the agency submitted its plans that the city could find some way to make it work.

But the state had to be involved because ACAP receives state funding to care for its DSHS kids.

“The state fire marshall and the DSHS officer of the Early Learning Program have the final say on whether the facility can be licensed for use,” Hursh said.

Hursh accompanied the state deputy fire marshall, a city plans examiner and the city fire marshall on the inspection three weeks ago. That inspection revealed critical deficiencies.

“ACAP had been licensed for 89 kids in their prior location,” Hursh said. “The state wouldn’t do the amount of licensing for this building without a sprinkler system in place, a fire alarm and a two-hour fire wall.

“There is a provision within the state code and the city code that for 50 kids or fewer, there are different requirements in place,” Hursh added. “ACAP made the proposal to the city and to the state that the two-hour firewall in place would allow them to get occupancy at 50 kids. Now they can continue to receive state funding for their DSHS kids, and the city has signed off on it as well. The long-term goal, however, is to put in a sprinkler system for the good of the kids.”