Plans to have activities for street youth at the Connaught Youth Centre will have to be approved by city council.
The new board of the CYC, acting on orders from provincial funding sources, is looking to expand their youth outreach progamming. It is currently home to four local cadet groups, plus a boxing club, and rents its gymnasium out to additional users like a badminton group and floor hockey or basketball for inner city kids.
The building is zoned for 24-hour use. Social advocates, including on the CYC board, consider it both a good location and perfect layout for hosting regular activities for at-risk kids.
The owner of the building - the City of Prince George - applied some caution to those hopes after the story broke in The Citizen. The city leases the facility to the local branch of the Legion, which in turn sublets it to the cadets and the boxing club.
These activities got prior approval from the city, as is necessary under the lease agreement.
"I have the ability to approve non-contentious usage," said Ian Wells, the city's manager of real estate. "But this has the potential to be contentious, so it would be referred to council for their approval."
One resident contacted The Citizen to plead against the plan. Helen Robertson said she had lived in the Connaught neighbourhood for decades and has seen it deteriorate to the point of having to lock the doors even when everyone is at home. Attracting street youth, she said, would perhaps make things even worse.
"We are not the VLA. People live here, we are not dead, but we are being treated like we don't exist. Nobody is asking our permission for this," she said. "I am 67. I am scared of the unknown, of what could happen. I don't care about anything else, I am just scared. We are mostly senior citizens. We're homeowners. Give us a break. It can't be all about them all the time."
Wells said there had not been a formal request made to add any users to the facility, the idea was merely a concept at this stage.
