News

DE HAAN BOOST FOR YOUTH CENTRE 

Youngsters could  soon have their own youth centre after the Roger de Haan Charitable Trust stepped in to provide a building at Kingsmead Park in Folkestone.

The building, leased to the Folkestone Youth Project on a peppercorn rent will be open on 8 November for prospective stakeholders to come along for a presentation on future plans for the project.

This marks another major step for the Project towards providing a centre for the youth with the facilities that they want. 

The building that will house the project is currently just a shell and visitors to the event will be given a chance to contribute to the design of the centre and the facilities it will provide, meet the people on the project committee and listen to performances by “Funky Town� and other youth contributors.

Councillor Terry Begent, Chair of the Board of Trustees said: “When I was a teenager in the sixties, there was a popular song* that included the line ‘I’d like to help you son but you’re too young to vote..’ For some reason that line has haunted me ever since because it sums up both the frustration of young people trying to get things done and the attitude of politicians and, indeed, most of the rest of society towards them:- ‘They don’t really count so we don’t have to put ourselves out to do anything for them’. Well, the key to this project is that, just as it was for the skatepark at the sports centre, it is the young people themselves that are taking the lead in providing their own facilities. We’re just following on behind to give them the help they need in doing it.

"It’s just a pity that those people who complain most about young people causing a nuisance on the streets are the same people who seem determined to stop anyone providing anywhere for them to go. Just look at the skatepark, for example, skateboarders were being hounded off the streets so they got together with Go Folkestone to find a home for their sport. 

"A grant from KCC helped to build what is widely regarded as the finest skatepark in the region but it is now being forced to close because of complaints from just three local ‘nimbys’ about the noise, not from the young people enjoying themselves but from the wheels of their boards running across the ground.

"Those ‘nimbys’ and anyone else who complains about the provision of facilities for young people should consider what has happened in the town since April when the ‘FREESPACE’ project concentrated on Hythe because of the problems they were having there and one of our local youth workers went on sick leave after being injured in a road accident. The absence of these two youth provisions has been reflected in a 25% increase in youth crime in the town.

"Facilities like the Folkestone Youth Project are an essential part of the process of helping young people to enjoy their youth whilst developing into responsible citizens – the two are not mutually exclusive – and we want as many local businesses and organisations to be involved in the process as possible. It is, after all, an investment in the future that will pay dividends in the form of less anti-social behaviour and a greater involvement of young people in the life of our town“

The project was started two years ago by the Go Folkestone action group as part of its work to reduce the night time crime in the centre of town by youngsters with nowhere to go and was aimed specifically at young people on the edge of society. A project team under the chairmanship of local MP Michael Howard was formed to bring the project on stream. 

It was two years ago when young people from the town were invited to special events to give their views on what they wanted and have been consulted at all stages of the scheme.

The Shepway Youth Forum have also taken the project under their wing and are not only being consulted on what they want but are also involved in the project team.