A new dance studio is scheduled to open in downtown Hermiston.

Jr. Jam Dance Annex on 157 E. Main St. Hermiston, has its logo painted on its window and is targeting a Sept. 1 opening date. Its owner, Debbie Kishpaugh, already has locations in Pendleton and said she is eager to open up shop in Hermiston.

“It’s interesting being in a different town, not knowing people,” Kishpaugh, said.

A Pendleton resident, Kishpaugh said this development is the latest step up in her career and she feels good about her latest business venture.

When she was in her mid 20s, she said, she became a fitness director at a gym. Soon afterward, she started a dance program at the gym. Dance classes took place alongside swimming and other athletics.

“It took off,” Kishpaugh said. “One dance class became two, and the two became more. It just grew.”

During that time, Kishpaugh married and later gave birth to a daughter. At the age of 5, her daughter was diagnosed with a brain tumor.

“That changed my life,” the dance studio owner said.

Kishpaugh said she reduced her work hours, focused more on her family and “began to see life differently.” Then, she left her job in 1999 to open her own business, a dance studio that would give her freedom to spend more time with her family.

Jr. Jam Dance Studio was a success right away, she said.

“It wasn’t a plan, and it wasn’t something I could have dreamed of,” she said. “It just kind of happened, and I’m thankful for it.”

Likewise, her growth into Hermiston with the annex was not her intended direction. Kishpaugh said she was trying to grow her business in Pendleton. As she was obtaining more acrobatics students, she was planning to add another studio somewhere in Pendleton but was not making headway.

“I just kept hitting a wall, then hitting a wall and hitting a wall,” she said.

Earlier this year, as she was traveling to a competition, she said she felt God whispering in her ear to go to Hermiston. She responded by coming to town, where she saw an empty building on Main Street.

She said “one thing led to another, with doors opening up for her to start in Hermiston.

“Hermiston was welcoming,” she said. “I appreciate that it was so easy.”

Kishpaugh said she visited the Hermiston City Hall and was greeted by people who laid out all of the necessary paperwork to open the business in town. They made everything simple, she said.

She said she will offer several forms of dance at the annex. Jazz, hip hop, ballet, acrobatics and production are planned, most beginning when the studio opens Sept. 1. Acrobatics begins in October.

Kishpaugh called the three instructors working with her at the studio “top notch.” One of the teachers has years of experience working under Kishpaugh. The two others work for Hermiston High School as dance coaches.

Weeks ahead of its first day, the area that instructors and their students will be moving into is already largely completed. Kishpaugh said that mirrors, sound equipment, and more were in place by mid-August.

“Throughout the year, I might have to do other things,” she said. “I’ll purchase mats and that kind of stuff.”

Mostly, though, she is ready to begin.

For more information, go to the studio’s website at jrjamdance.com.