When most people think about a community center, they think of a ball field, a meeting room, perhaps a pool or gym if they’re ambitious.

Visitors at the grand opening of the 15-acre Salvation Army Ray and Joan Kroc Corps Community Center in Kapolei Saturday saw all of the above, as well as water slides, a 48-bed dormitory, party cabanas, a 500-seat worship and performing arts center, an early childhood education center, an art studio, a game room and even a full-fledged catering kitchen and banquet facility.

Kapolei resident Margery Perez was floored by what she saw from her new neighbor.

"This is overwhelming," Perez said. "This is what we need, to get the kids out of trouble, get them occupied."

Perez said her family will be thinking of sending three grandchildren to the facility.

Community leaders called the $133 million center’s opening a key step in the maturation of Oahu’s fastest-growing region, noting it is across from the upcoming University of Hawaii-West Oahu campus on Kualakai Parkway, formerly North-South Road.

Not scheduled to open officially until Wednesday, the facility has already signed up more than 1,500 members. Up to five family members under the same roof can pay a flat monthly rate of $99; a family with six or more pays $109.

Among those filling out an application Saturday were Makakilo residents Jose and Evajene Asuncion, who have three kids, ages 11, 9 and 5. Evajene Asuncion said the family plan makes sense for her household.

"For what they have here? It’s not just a fitness facility," she said. "They’ve got dance programs, and the worship center."

Son Lennox Asuncion, a Barbers Point Elementary kindergartner, said he’s most looking forward to splashing in the water play section of the aquatic center.

The community center is due largely to the generosity of Joan Kroc, widow of McDonald’s founder Ray Kroc.

The Kroc portion for the Kapolei center was $110 million. Community leaders, led by former First Hawaiian Bank chief executive Don Horner, organized a $23 million fundraising campaign.

Amy Ragen, Joan Kroc’s granddaughter, said at Saturday’s opening that her grandmother was inspired to put up the first community center after driving through a lower-income section of San Diego one day and not being able to find any parks or playgrounds.

That first Kroc Center was completed in 2002. The next year, when Joan Kroc died, she left $1.8 billion to the Salvation Army to develop community centers across the United States. It is considered the largest one-time charitable gift ever given to a single entity. The Kapolei facility is the 17th of 27 scheduled, Salvation Army officials said.

"She wanted to build a place where people of all economic and cultural backgrounds could go where they would feel accepted and loved, a place that provided opportunities for growth and development in the physical, artistic, educational and spiritual fields," Ragen said.

"She felt these centers could make a profound difference in children’s futures … that our children were our future, and if they were not provided for, and given opportunities to flourish, how could they improve the state of our world?"