Officials of the city Department of Budget and Fiscal Services are monitoring the Waipahu Community Adult Day Health Center and Youth Day Care Center to see if they are in compliance with a federal grant program that provided $2.7 million for the center to be built.

Several budget officials yesterday visited the vacant 9,000-square-foot facility, which some refer to as the Waipahu community center. However, "the monitoring is not completed yet," said Mark Oto, the city's deputy budget and fiscal services director.

A spokesman for the Hawai'i Housing Finance Development Corp., which leases the space to the center for $1 a year, said that agency is also looking into recent developments at the facility.

Cal Kawamoto, the president of the centers, ordered nonprofit O'ahu Head Start to vacate its space last Friday, a decision that forced about 30 preschoolers and their teachers to relocate this week. About half are at a temporary site in Kunia, about eight miles north of their old preschool.

In addition, the Health For All program for seniors was evicted from the site earlier last month.

Kawamoto said the two entities did not pay their monthly lease, which had consisted of only maintenance fees. The two entities said they stopped paying because of questions about who managed the facility, and because they were not given written justification about why their lease fees were going up.

Oto said the city helped the center receive funding from the federal Community Development Block Grant Program and is responsible for periodic monitoring to ensure compliance with the conditions of the award.

Among the requirements is that 100 percent of the five-year-old center be used to provide services for elderly and youth from low- and moderate-income families, Oto said. The center must also return any net proceeds considered income to either the city or the Community Development Block Grant Program, he said.

What's unclear in the rules is how long a facility like the Waipahu center can be allowed to remain vacant, Oto said. "There's no specific timeline so we've got to determine what is reasonable," he said.

Kawamoto said he took city officials around the facility and provided them with financial documents and other materials.

He said he is in the process of trying to find other adult and childcare providers to replace Head Start, a subsidiary of the Honolulu Community Action Program, and Health For All.

The former state senator said procurement laws require him to get bids from three different vendors for each site. He currently has one for the adult daycare side and is having two childcare providers visit the center this week.

Kawamoto's board is in litigation with Health For All and a group claiming to be the legitimate board for the center. Head Start has been talking to attorneys about its situation, said Lynn Cabato, O'ahu Head Start director.

Cabato said while Head Start is trying to find an alternate site nearer to where it was, the ideal situation would be if the preschool were allowed to return to the Waipahu community center.