Youth centre coming to Belleville
BELLEVILLE – Belleville will finally be getting a youth centre, according to executive director of Quinte Youth for Christ Colin Leaver.
Leaver pitched the plan to city council on Monday.
Quinte YFC is looking at locations for the centre after the overwhelmingly positive reaction at city council. Leaver said there are some serious options that the organization it looking at but he cannot speak about them at this time.
“We have ideas, what would be a great area,” he said. “I think any place would be fine. It’s kind of like your house – it doesn’t really matter where you live, if the place where you live is hospitable. Is it welcoming? Is it the kind of place people would feel warm and welcome? And that doesn’t mean the location – it means the culture of the house and how you welcome people. And it’s more about people that make it welcoming.”
When the Quinte YFC deputation met with council Monday, it had some specific questions, he said.
“The first one is just ‘Do you agree that youth are a need and an issue that we should spend time working on a solution for?’ Second we were asking for them to accept our deputation … Third is just the approval to move ahead. We don’t want to just build a youth centre without asking.”
The response was very positive.
“At the meeting they had four different council members stand up and give their support for (the centre) and ask how they can support us,” Leaver said. “I said, ‘Listen, if there’s any staff in the city that are able to sit on our leadership team to help us with the development, we would love to have the city’s input.’ So they made a motion and they approved of it, and so I’m looking forward to hearing back from the city as to how that will turn out.”
Councillor Kelly McCaw told QNet News that at this point Quinte YFC is just looking for support from council. She fully agrees that a youth centre should come to Belleville, she said.
“I’m such in favour of it that if I had my way we’d have one at every quadrant in Belleville … We really need one,” McCaw said. “There are a lot of kids unfortunately in this area that are living in at-risk neighbourhoods, I would consider. And they really need a place to go and feel safe and maybe feel loved and enjoy some things that maybe their parents aren’t able to give them. Or maybe activities, safe good activities, healthy activities, things like that.”
Councillor Egerton Boyce said he too supports the idea.
“One of the keys to a successful city is the youth in the community and helping the youth in the community with education and mentoring. And a very positive place will create a very good atmosphere in the community,” he said.
“There’s a number of times where we hear from our youth that there isn’t a safe place to go to to hang out, to enjoy themselves, to get the help that they need or just the positive peer interaction. And this will provide them with a safe atmosphere that will help them.”
Leaver said that the funding for a youth centre can come from many different sources: grants and support from the local community; individuals or businesses that would commit to give $10 or $20 a month; and big fundraising events. There is some very strong support in place already, he said.
“If you look at other cities – Quinte West is a good example. Ingersoll, Peterborough, Toronto, Cambridge – so many cities have youth centres which are positive places for youth to go and learn about life, (to) experience things that they would never have an opportunity to do,” Leaver said. “So think just a positive space for young people to find opportunities to grow in life.”
Over the next few months Quinte Youth for Christ is going to be finalizing plans. Leaver said the group would like the centre to be open as soon as possible.
“Young people are growing up every day and leaving home, and young people are discouraged every day,” he said. “And it’s not just that young people are discouraged; it’s that young people are bored and they’re just sitting around with nothing to do. And having a positive place to go is important and it needs to happen now.”
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