Sedgwick County will spend $5.4 million to buy downtown building, lots. Here’s why & where

Sedgwick County will purchase a vacant building and two adjacent lots in downtown Wichita for $5.4 million to meet a growing need and expand mental health services, commissioners said Wednesday.

The building will need to be renovated. Commissioners approved $15.4 million for the entire project in 2022.

When it’s done, it will house the Substance Abuse Center of Kansas and COMCARE’s Crisis Community Center and Sedgwick County Offender Assessment Program. Those services are currently in a county-owned building and a leased space.

The site encompasses the 35,000-square-foot building at 235 S. Topeka and the two lots north of it. The 1920 building and two lots are owned by Cornejo Holdings LLC. The combined building and lots have an appraised value of $959,790. The appraised value is often much lower than actual value.

The planned $300 million Biomedical Campus, a collaborative effort between WSU, WSU Tech and the University of Kansas, will take the rest of the buildings on the block and a chunk of the block across the street.

Commissioners said the proximity of mental health services with the Biomedical Campus will allow for collaboration that will benefit both.

“This is a great day for Sedgwick County,” commissioner Jim Howell said.

Commissioner David Dennis said: “It is going to serve us well in the future. I am completely on board with this.”

Dennis said this had been years in the making, with Sedgwick County collaborating with the late and former Wichita State University president John Bardo and with current president Richard Muma.

The campus is expected to be done in 2026. The county hopes to be done then as well.