The Cape Ann YMCA's Gloucester Teen Center, closed due to city budget cuts in 2003, will return thanks to a $75,000 grant from the Massachusetts Department of Education that was announced last week.
The reborn Teen Center will function as a "hub of operations" for a network of teen-based programs and activities sponsored both by the YMCA and other organizations, said Rick Doucette, YMCA executive director of camp and teen services. The center will also provide a safe place for kids to go after school, he added.
"Some days it is the place to drop by after school, others it is a time to find out what there is to get involved in," Doucette said. "There are no boundaries on what it can be. The more that we can do for the kids the better."
The new Teen Center will be located at 9 Center St., next door to its old home at 5 Center St.
The first Teen Center opened in 1998 as a collaboration between the city and YMCA, with the city contributing $35,000 a year. After then-Gov. Mitt Romney cut state aid to cities and towns in 2002, the city pulled its share of the funding.
The state grant, from the Department of Elementary and Secondary Education's After-School/Out-of-School Time program, will provide another $75,000 next year if the Teen Center is successful, Doucette said. The YMCA has not yet announced a re-opening date for the facility.
Doucette said examples of things that could take place at the Teen Center include guitar lessons, movie nights and academic tutoring. It could help connect teens to the Chill Zone recreation area at the Cape Ann Business Incubator on Rogers Street or to the Teen Clean work program that helped refurbish parts of the city this summer.
Doucette, who will work out of the Teen Center, has re-focused his work for the Cape Ann YMCA on teen services and Camp Spindrift in West Gloucester in the past year.
He said the precise activities and services at the Teen Center were impossible to define right now, because they would evolve and develop based on what the kids and community make it.
"It's a team of people focused on providing healthy recreational activities, matching kids up with each other, knowing what teens can do on any given night," Doucette said.
"We are trying to take away the excuse of 'I am bored, of course I got in trouble,'" he said. "If you want to create what to do and have a force, you have an opportunity."
Patrick Anderson can be reached at panderson@gloucestertimes.com
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