Josh Darby was a senior in high school when he first became involved in the Academy of Children’s Theatre in Richland. Having watched the nonprofit grow since nearly the beginning, the theater’s artistic and educational director found the recent ribbon cutting at its facility at 213 Wellsian Way especially meaningful.

The event celebrated the end of ACT’s latest transformation of the Windermere Children’s Theatre. The once diverse assortment of used couches and former movie theater seating has been replaced by risers with cushioned folding chairs for theater goers, enough for more than 218 people. Sound and lighting techs also now have a proper sound box at the top of those risers to support each performance.

“I remember back in the day when it was a warehouse,” Darby said. “To go from that to where we are today is amazing.”

The project, first envisioned a few years after the nonprofit moved into the building in 2004, was stalled by the Covid-19 pandemic. But 30 years after it began, the dedication of ACT’s leadership and supporters has ensured it has a next chapter.

“The kids are able to treat their art at the level they deserve,” said Zackery Alexzander Stephens, ACT’s managing director. “I think it really shows them your community cares about you.”

Founded by Linda Hoffman in 1995, ACT provides education programs themed around different theatrical and literary ideas to thousands of youth each year. Students learn everything from the basics of theater to the overall production of a live performance. ACT typically puts on six productions a year.

ACT began renovating the space to add two classrooms and a black box theater that seats about 140 people shortly after moving in. In September 2018, 400 seats from the closed Regal 8 movie theater were donated by Columbia Center mall. The late Jeff Thompson, owner of Windermere Group One, donated $350,000 as the facility’s naming sponsor and it remains Windermere Children’s Theatre.

As programming grew, so did plans to expand the performance space. A fundraising effort began in 2018 to support an estimated $1.5 million capital construction campaign. It was focused on bringing theater seating to 300, updating the building’s HVAC and electrical systems and securing other theater equipment.

The pandemic, which shut down community gathering spaces and facilities in early 2020 due to public health precautions, forced the nonprofit to put those improvements on hold and focus on keeping its programs alive. The theater’s annual revenues are currently about $350,000 per year, according to IRS filings, about half what they were prior to the pandemic.

Eventually, fundraising and improvements were restarted, allowing ACT to push the project to the finish line.

Stephens said the nonprofit isn’t resting on its laurels. The board and ACT staff are already planning for the next five years, including the possible establishment of an endowment that could help it better weather disruptions such as the pandemic. Planning also is underway for its annual Hearts for the Arts fundraiser.

Darby said he hopes word of the revamped theater and seating, with improved sight lines and more accessibility for theater goers with limited mobility, will lead people who’ve never seen an ACT production to check out a show, such as its holiday performance, “The Best Christmas Pageant Ever: The Musical,” running Dec. 5-14.

Regardless, the organization has found its footing again and is excited for the future, he said.

“I think we’ve got enough momentum to keep it up,” Darby said.