The Fort Bend Children's Discovery Center project reached its fundraising goal of $3.65 million just in time for the Dec. 31 deadline, the Children's Museum of Houston announced Jan. 10. Donations from The George Foundation and Mercedes-Benz of Sugar Land capped off the more than year-long fundraising effort.

The money is earmarked for the construction of the Discovery Center along with its first three years of operational costs, said Tammie Kahn, executive director of the Children's Museum of Houston.

Fundraising efforts began April 2012 with a $1 million grant from The George Foundation that the Discovery Center campaign was able to match by an October 2013 deadline.

Donations have been received from dozens of organizations, businesses and individuals throughout Fort Bend County, capital campaign manager Tracy Golden said.

"It's a clear indication of just how important this facility will be for all of Fort Bend," she said. "The community is truly embracing the fact that the [center] will provide a world-class learning environment, which will enrich the educational lives of all children in Fort Bend County and beyond."

The Discovery Center is expected to contract a design firm in early 2014 to complete the final plans for the exhibits. The project will move forward as a joint venture between the city of Sugar Land and Johnson Development Corporation to remodel and move into the 12,000-square-foot former container warehouse within Imperial Sugar Land—a mixed-use development surrounding the Imperial Sugar Factory site along Hwy. 90 at Main Street.

Construction of the Discovery Center is slated to begin later this year and is expected to be completed by mid-2015. Once complete, the center will house six exhibits aimed at educating young visitors. The exhibits are modeled after such questions as, "Can I Solve That?" and "How Are We Alike?"

The center is being established as a sister location to the Children's Museum of Houston in downtown. Naming opportunities are available for several of the exhibits as well as painted tiles. For more information or to make a donation, call 713-535-7237 or visit www.fortbendchildrensdc.org.