LEWISTON — Senior citizens played cards at five tables in the senior room of the Multi-Purpose Center on Tuesday as fans circulated warm air.

It isn’t fancy, but the Lewiston Senior Citizens consider the space theirs.

They said they were unhappy with a proposal by Lewiston School Superintendent Bill Webster to move them out of the Multi-Purpose Center to make way for a prekindergarten center.

“It’s not a good idea for us,” said Cecile Leblond who plays cribbage twice a week at the center.

Larry Fortier, 86, who was playing bridge Tuesday, said he was disappointed. The center is a perfect location, he said. “If at all possible, we should be allowed to stay here.”

Shirley Labonte said it would be “a shame” if seniors lost their space. “In a few years, they’re going to build a school, anyways. Why not now?”

Roger Labbe called the proposal disturbing. “If they close this place down, we’ll have no place to go,” said Labbe, a retired Lewiston Middle School teacher. “They wanted us to go to the armory. The problem with the armory is our seniors have no place to park. The teachers at the middle school take all the parking.”

And, seniors would have to climb stairs at the armory, he said. “Many seniors have walkers, canes, crutches.”

Labbe runs the cribbage league on Thursdays and a card game called pitch on Tuesdays. “It’s really good for my seniors,” he said.

He plans to organize fellow seniors to “discuss this and find out what our options are.”

Rosemarie Goodwin, also a retired middle school teacher, said it’s important that seniors, “who have been paying their taxes for all of these years have a place they can go to. They do come here. And now they’re very sad, very upset.”

Many depend on the center, she said. “This is the only place they come to. This is where they meet their friends.” In addition to games, some come to sit and talk, use the computers, get books or attend monthly meetings and meals.

Lewiston Senior Citizens has 350 members, Recreation Department Director Maggie Chisholm said.

The department uses the center for a variety of events, she said, including after-school or weekend gymnastics, volleyball and cheering. Local groups, from veterans to Somali immigrants, use the meeting space.

“For the rec department, it would really hurt us,” Chisholm said.

Webster said Tuesday that his proposal would leave the adult education center downstairs. “It’s the upstairs we would take over.”

If the city does turn the building over to the School Department, no program would end, Webster said. The city would find another space.

City Administrator Ed Barrett said school officials will give a presentation to the City Council at 5:30 p.m. Tuesday, Sept. 20, in the city council chambers. No decision about the space will be made then, he said.

“We’ll ask the School Department to look at alternatives,” Barrett said. The council also will ask for numbers on how much the center is used.

Only after that data is collected will an answer be given to the School Department, Barrett said. “It’s not going to be a quick decision.”

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