Grant for Whitmore Center

The Eleanor Whitmore Early Childhood Center will be able to upgrade its heating and air-conditioning system, replace its roof and outdoor siding, finish renovations to its kitchen, and complete other capital projects thanks to a $250,000 grant from New York State.

New York State Assemblyman Fred W. Thiele Jr. formally announced the grant during a press conference at the center in East Hampton Village on Monday.

“You do an outstanding job and it’s good to be able to help,” he said to the center’s board members and administrators who had gathered for the announcement.

The grant came from the state’s community facilities program, through which legislators can request funding for local organizations they deem important and in need of support.

“There is, in my opinion, no more worthwhile project than what you’re doing here at the Eleanor Whitmore Center,” Mr. Thiele said. “I know you’ve got many things to do here, and hopefully this will help toward that.”

“We are in great need of this kind of support. We have a lot of projects that we need to take care of,” said Ruth Ann W. McSpadden, chairwoman of the board of directors. “We’re trying to work our way through a list of things that either need to be overhauled or maintained. We have a lot of long-deferred maintenance. We want to create the most wonderful, safe environment for these children.”

Eleanor Whitmore, a founder and longtime supporter of the center, remains the honorary chairwoman of its board of directors. “This grant answers our prayers,” she said Monday.

The $250,000 grant will go specifically toward capital improvements but beyond that, Maureen Wikane, the center’s executive director, said, the nonprofit needs to raise about $400,000 each year toward its $1.4 million operating budget to be financially solvent.

The Eleanor Whitmore Early Childhood Center has its roots as a day-care center and senior citizen center, beginning its programs in a house donated in 1969. Since the 1996-97 school year the center has been the provider of the East Hampton School District’s prekindergarten program, which was extended to a full day for the first time in the 2015-16 school year. East Hampton pays tuition for 54 four-year-olds to attend prekindergarten there. As of late July, there was a waiting list of about seven children; an updated figure was not available this week.

The center also runs tuition-based day- care programs for children as young as 18 months.