The Genoveva Chavez Community Center project commenced with city and county governments, residents, neighborhood organizations, youth and sports clubs, various interest groups, and adjacent landowners generating a community-endorsed land purchase and annexation agreement, master plan, and facility program through a series of workshops and focus groups.

Through these workshops emerged a desire to bring the community together through shared activities. Counsilman-Hunsaker’s goal was to design an aquatic facility that would reflect this desire and also express its unifying purpose by physically integrating the building into the cityscape.

To express the Community Center's purpose as a community gathering place, three main activity areas – the Natatorium, Ice Arena, and Gymnasium – are grouped around a multi-level atrium space which visually connects all four acres of the Center’s footprint. This transparency fosters a sense of community within the building by allowing guests to sense and experience other activities while they are swimming, ice skating, running, strength-training, dining, or just passing from one area to another.