Adam Prudhomme
Beaver Staff
A sanctuary for youth in the region will be closing its doors early next month. The Kingston Community Health Centre announced this week it would have to suspend its Chill Zone youth program effective Feb. 2 due to lack of funding.
Launched in 2012, the Chill Zone has been housed in several locations across Napanee before finally settling in the recently opened Napanee Area Community Health Centre. From there it has offered programming two nights a week.
“We have the youth attending and we have the support of our community partners,” said Lisa Lund, interim manager of KCHC’s youth services. “We’ve built a collaborative with other youth organizations. Funding is our only barrier at this point.”
Attendance was never the issue, as there were over 200 youths attending the program.
“The Chill Zone was built as a program to remove barriers that are common for youths in rural communities,” said Lund. “Things like transportation to access services, or cost. We offered free transportation for all our youth and our services are free….The Chill Zone was built out of that desire to build access to service. Things like employment services, youth recreation, mentorship, access to primary care service, mental health support. Those are the things we were offering at the Chill Zone as well as a hot meal.”
The program may be ceasing but the need for it will still persist. Many of the youth it works with are considered vulnerable and could be greatly impacted by not having a safe place with positive role models. That’s why KCHC is already working on a plan to revive the program as soon as possible.
“We’ve noted that there is a desire in our youth to have more support in regards to education after school,” said Lund. “They say to us they might not have a computer at home or a printer or they may be struggling with their homework or assignments and they were looking for more tutoring support. So we want to take some time to revision the program a little bit and start conversations with community partners and the local school to see if we can work together to deliver the same services we were delivering while adding in a little more of an academic component to it.”
Lund says they’re striving to operate five nights a week as opposed to the two nights they have been open.
“(The teens in the community) feel a loss that support is no longer there,” said Lund. “We’re working hard to transition them to some of our partners in the community.”
This isn’t the first time the Chill Zone has felt the financial crunch. This will mark the third time the KCHC has had to suspend the program in the last six years due to lack of funding.
“This isn’t the end of the Chill Zone,” said Lund. “We really are working hard to revision a bit, to apply for different funding and hopefully to recruit more interest in the community in order to re-open hopefully in the near future.”