April 2005 · City Council 1999-2007
$300,000 for Inner City Youth
When you represent a district where too many young people have nothing to do after school and nowhere to go, you either accept that reality or you change it. I changed it.
Working with Councilwoman Saundra McFadden-Weaver, I announced $300,000 in PIAC (Public Improvements Advisory Committee) funds to assist in the funding of the Champions Sports Complex for inner city youth in the Third District. This was not a symbolic resolution or a study. This was real money directed at a multi-use recreational complex at Woodland Elementary School, replacing a concrete play area and a large vacant lot at 9th and Woodland, with organized sports and character building programs for children ages 7 to 14. The concept evolved from a proposal by the Twelfth Street Heritage Development Corporation.
The Context
Too many children in the district had no safe place to play and few organized programs to keep them on track after school.
The conventional city response to youth issues was fragmented. Different departments ran different programs with different eligibility requirements and different funding cycles. Nobody was coordinating. Nobody was measuring outcomes. And the young people who needed help the most were falling through the gaps.
In addition to the city's $300,000 PIAC contribution, the project was awarded a $100,000 grant by the NFL Grassroots Program, a partnership of the NFL Youth Football Fund and the national office of the Local Initiatives Support Corporation (LISC). Start-up costs were projected at approximately $500,000 for construction and $1.5 million for program costs, through a public-private partnership.
Why I Fought For This
I fought for this because I remembered what it was like to be a young person without resources. I grew up in public housing. I know what happens to young people who have talent but no access. Some of them find their way out through education, athletics, or sheer determination. Most do not. Not because they lack ability, but because nobody invested in them at the moment when investment mattered most.
Youth programs are easy to cut and hard to fund because young people do not vote and do not lobby. Securing $300,000 required political will, strategic advocacy, and a willingness to prioritize a population that most politicians acknowledge in speeches but ignore in budgets.
Every project The Nash Group develops today includes a consideration of youth impact. When we build affordable housing, we think about the children who will live there. Are there schools nearby? Are there after school programs? Are there safe outdoor spaces? These questions come from the same impulse that drove the $300,000 youth investment.
This is what we mean by community engagement.
Not a meeting series. Presence, on their schedule, until something changes.