New Da Vinci Science Center wants to focus on community
Downtown development’s plan to help youth, residents has won over skeptics
Leaders at the new Da Vinci Science Center in downtown Allentown want the new $65 million investment to be more than just a tourist attraction.
The 67,000-square-foot center, with a planned opening date in 2024, will have three times the amount of exhibit space as its existing location at Cedar Crest College, which opened in 2005. It is expected to attract 400,000 annual visitors, create 487 full-time jobs and bring in $33 million of economic output.
But Da Vinci Science Center Executive director Lin Erickson said the center is committed to being a “community-based” center that is a resource to Allentown youth and low-income people.
“We don’t want to be just dropping in an office center or an organization dropping in, saying ‘let’s bring some tourists,’ we want to be a center where residents feel it is their science center,” Erickson said.
The center’s goal is to hire staff that reflect the demographics of the Lehigh Valley as a whole — Lehigh and Northampton counties are around 83% white, 22% Latino and 8.9% Black. She called those statistics a “baseline” but said she hopes the center can do even better than that. Allentown is more than 50% Latino and around 14% Black.
The center is also piloting a program that would allow recipients of the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program to visit the museum for less than $3 a person, or $30 a year for a membership providing unlimited visits. Around a quarter of Allentown residents live in poverty, and 90% of families with children enrolled with the Allentown School District are considered low-income.
With limited marketing efforts, the existing center
has seen more than 670 residents benefit from the program. Leaders hope to expand that program when the new science center opens, though they have not set a firm goal of how many residents they will provide discounted tickets.
The center plans to hire more bilingual staff — the center already has six bilingual educators working at its west Allentown location — and all exhibits in the new center will also be in Spanish and English.
“Yes, it is tourism, it will help bring more people downtown and hopefully be a catalyst for more people going to restaurants and shopping,” Erickson said. “But another really important aspect is the fact that we’re right in the middle of a lot of neighborhoods, and there are over 50,000 residents within one mile walking distance.”
Allentown City Council member Ce-Ce Gerlach joined a unanimous council vote to award Da Vinci $1 million in American Rescue Plan funding last month. Gerlach, who has criticized downtown development and raised concerns about gentrification, said she was impressed by the center’s stated commitments to Allentown residents.
“My experience with all the other development, as a center city resident, is that the development doesn’t benefit us, if anything, it pushes us out and directly excludes us,” Gerlach said. “[Erickson and I] talked about that and ways to change that and be different, and not be like every other shiny building downtown, but be a shiny building that benefits the people, community, kids, and actually uplifts people surrounding the center.”
“I didn’t expect [Erickson] to actually put the time and work and energy in that, but she did,” she added. “Usually people are at least willing to listen and say they will do things and make efforts, but most people don’t, most organizations don’t, but she did and her organization did.”
At a meeting last year to discuss city ARPA allocations, several residents questioned why Da Vinci was singled out over other nonprofits for an award, and accused the city of showing unfair preference to the science center and the Lehigh Valley IronPigs, which was also considered for an award.
But since then, the center has won over more community support. Da Vinci leaders have formed a community science advisory committee made up of Allentown residents, who have both spread the word about the center to their neighbors, and helped guide the center’s hiring and equity initiatives. Comments at the October meeting, where city council granted the money, urged city council to approve the funding and touted its benefits and commitment to equity.
“This is a walkable, community idea that’s needed,” said Millie Canales, president of the Old Fairgrounds Neighborhood. Association. “If we are going to give $1.5 million to something, I would like to see that.”
“We’re investing in the future of our children, that is so key,” said Pas Simpson, head of Promise Neighborhood’s Zero Youth Violence program. “Education, we’re talking about math, we’re talking about technology, things that they’re not gonna get from [the Allentown School District].”
Some council members, including Gerlach, have demanded the city use American Rescue Plan dollars to address dire community needs like poverty, homelessness and gun violence.
Erickson concedes that the center won’t directly address those issues. But the new science center, in the heart of Allentown’s downtown, will fill a muchneeded void for youth programming in Allentown, providing kids with an outlet and inspiration for their future careers.
“If we can be a comfortable place where kids can come in the summer, on weekends, and have a place they feel is theirs,” Erickson said. “If we can be that kind of place, not only are we providing a fun outlet after school, but we’re also educating, and kids are getting exposed to careers, meetings scientists and engineers and starting to think about what they might do for a career.”
“My experience with all the other development, as a center city resident, is that the development doesn’t benefit us, if anything, it pushes us out and directly excludes us” — Ce-Ce Gerlach, Allentown City Council member