LiFT facility for neurodiverse children and adults opens in Clearwater
By Breanne Williams
Tampa Bay Business Journal
Published: Sep 5, 2023

LiFT, or Learning Independent for Tomorrow, has opened a new educational facility for neurodiverse children and adults at the former Suncoast YMCA in Clearwater.

The 60,000-square-foot building sits on 7.2 acres, located at 1005 South Highland Ave., and will hold a ribbon cutting Tuesday to commemorate the transformation of the facility. Shawn Naugle, executive director of LiFT, said in the new space the school has 170 students, a record high for LiFT. Once the renovation of the facility is complete, they hope to increase enrollment to 400 students.

The group purchased the property in December 2021 for $3.8 million, according to a deed filed in Pinellas County. They have since undergone an extensive renovation of the space to transform it into a school.

“Altogether LiFT went into this with a $16 million capital campaign goal,” Naugle said. “That included the purchase price of the building and the phase 1 renovation which includes about 40,000 square feet of renovation initially. As of right now, LiFT has met just over 50% of our $16 million capital campaign goal. Everything from top to bottom is a complete design-build renovation.”

The new space will allow for expanded classrooms, art, music and science spaces, sensory and therapeutic rooms and more mentoring opportunities.

Scott Goyer, president and CEO of YMCA of the Suncoast, said the building was constructed in 1966 and the YMCA renovated it in 2003. Goyer said the work LiFT has accomplished has been “a wonderful transformation to watch.”

“I was so excited that this building, which has served the community with Y programming for well over 50 years, is now going to be a community asset instead of being torn down and made into multifamily housing or some other thing,” Goyer said. “It’s now going to be used to address critical needs in our community again in a different way and a different entity.”

He said the YMCA board was excited to see how they could make this work best, and while it was painful the YMCA would not be able to provide services in that building, they were looking forward to seeing another community-focused organization use the space.

LiFT opened 10 years ago and was operating out of a 16,000-square-foot space in the back of a church with 17 students. Now it offers K-12 classes, a university transition program and an adult training program. The school has a 95% standard high school diploma graduation rate and has individual support plans for each student.

Naugle said previously the primary enrollment area had been the city of Seminole, with a small percentage from Central Pinellas, Northern Pinellas and St. Petersburg. Now that the group is more centrally located, they are able to expand their capacity and will now be able to even serve Hillsborough families.

Naugle said they will continue to be partners with the YMCA of the Suncoast for a “very long time” and have plans to partner in the future for after-school and sports programming initiatives.

“Scott and his team could have easily quadrupled the amount of money they made on this campus and this space for something completely unrelated to any community initiative,” Naugle said. “It speaks volumes to the type of leader Scott is and the type of organization the YMCA is that they saw it as a community-driven project they wanted to ensure continued to serve the community.”