6/20/2013 Julie McDonald Commentary: Discover! Children’s Museum Is a Boon for the Local Economy

Thursday, June 20, 2013
Julie McDonald, Chronicle Columnist

A third of the people who visited the Discover! Children’s Museum simply saw the signs and stopped by, while two-thirds made the trip to the Twin City Town Center specifically for fun at the museum.

“I think that was a surprising figure for us,” said Allyn Roe, vice chair of the board overseeing the museum. “We just assumed it was a destination.”

In May alone, the museum saw 1,677 paid visitors, which includes children and adults (anyone age 12 months and younger is free). From February, when the museum opened, through May, the children’s museum welcomed 8,367 paid attendees. In May alone, the museum greeted children on 13 field trips, said Marilyn Chintella, a retired Toledo Middle School teacher who serves as director of the pilot project.

“That’s triple what we forecast for the pilot,” Larry McGee, who backed the museum as former head of the Chehalis Community Renaissance Team, told members of the organization Friday.

I think it’s fabulous that the museum will remain open through October 31, especially since organizers are carefully calculating and tracking numbers of visitors and their ZIP codes (72 so far) — information they’ll use if and when they apply for grants to create a permanent museum.

“We have an excellent example up the road of one of the more financially successful programs,” McGee said, referring to Olympia’s children’s museum. “Nationally, very few get more than half of money from entry fees.”

The Olympia museum generates 65 percent of its money from admission fees, birthday parties and other programs. The rest comes from donations.

“If we’re going to build this, it’s got to be sustainable,” McGee said. We like to try to aim toward some kind of a design so we don’t have to dial for dollars.”

He doesn’t see the Chehalis museum as competing with Olympia; rather, he said they hope to draw more people from Longview, East Lewis County and the coastal communities.

“It’s about location, location, location,” McGee said, noting that in the current location, “There’s no higher traffic volume in the Twin Cities.”

The museum is renting the space “under the assumption we’ll be asked to leave,” McGee said.

But the major reason for extending the pilot is to give the museum and its volunteers a chance to interact more closely with schools during September and October. Chintella said a group of five educators met at the museum one evening to determine learning goals for each exhibit.

“We want to be a learning place, not just a playing place,” she said. “We wanted something parents and adults can use to initiate focused thinking for kids.”

The printed and laminated sheets at each exhibit list questions to prompt children to think at the exhibit, such as planning breakfast while shopping in the grocery store.

A 5-kilometer fun run to benefit the museum is scheduled for Saturday, sponsored by Realty World. That same day, free dental screening will be offered in the party room.

Chehalis Avenue

The city of Chehalis is seeking bids for major improvements to Chehalis Avenue, paid for in part with state and federal grant money. Bids will be opened July 11 for paving the street surface from Pacific to Main Street. Beautification with benches and rain garden plants is also planned from Park to Main, with money to be raised locally to cover the cost.

Also at the meeting, David Hartz, chairman of the Chehalis Community Renaissance Team, said local government leaders offered to buy a 20-mile section of rail between Chehalis and Maytown from the city of Tacoma. It might be used by the popular Chehalis-Centralia Steam Train, where July 13 is Kids Day and July 14 is Senior Day.

Julie McDonald, a personal historian from Toledo, may be reached at memoirs@chaptersoflife.com.