The Pavilion Youth and Community Café in Broadstairs needs your votes to help it win cash in The People’s Projects contest.
The competition, run by ITV with the Big Lottery Fund and the National Lottery, shortlists five projects in each region to go forward to the public vote. The three projects that receive the most votes in each region receive up to £50,000. The runners up will be offered a discretionary award of up to £5,000.
The Pavilion Youth and Community Café, which opened last year after fundraising and drawn out negotiations with Thanet council, is one of the projects competing in the Meridian East section.
The Zone club had been running for 12 years but always in rented premises – first St Andrew’s church hall in Reading Street, then at The Gap in Queens Road.
The aim had always been for the club to have a home of its own and to be able to launch a youth and community café.
The group raised about £25,000 to pay for the renovation work including asbestos removal, a partial new roof, internal reconfiguration, insulation, new outer cladding, new flooring, re-wire, re-plumb, new toilet, new kitchen, and painting throughout.
After 10 weeks of works, The Pavilion Youth and Community Café opened on Monday, November 6, and currently opens on Mondays, Wednesdays, and Fridays from 9am until 5pm. Mornings are for the wider community, and afternoons for young people aged 10-16. The club is also starting MiniZone baby and toddler group on Wednesdays, 11am-midday.
Now the community site is hoping to be awarded £24,800 to expand on its work, bringing together people of all ages.
On Thursday, April 19, The Zone Youth Club will showcase its project, The Pavilion Youth & Community Cafe, on ITV Meridian news at 6pm
If successful, The Zone Youth Club will use the grant to recruit more staff to help with the operation of the organisation, including running a 6 week summer holiday activity programme for young people.
Victoria Suchak, project manager at The Zone Youth Club said: “This is an exciting opportunity to raise awareness and support for our work and, with your help, to secure further much-needed funding. We urge local people to get behind us. If successful, our project will make a real difference to our local community by bringing together people of all ages.
“In addition to our youth work, there will be a toddler group, gardening, art and crafts, and a well-being group, all of which will encourage people to learn new skills, gain confidence, self-esteem and raise aspirations. The summer programme will provide daily lunch, sport and art activities for young people. The project aims to build on inter-generational and community relationships.”
The project, which aims to build on inter-generational and community relationships, also runs a café that is open to all.
The voting opens tomorrow (April 16) at 9am and closes at midday on Monday, April 30. People can vote once per region and will need an email address.
Winners will be announced on Thursday, May 3 on the 6pm regional ITV news.
