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Youngsters' travelling club is the antidote to Asbos
A pioneering "mobile youth village" which saw antisocial behaviour rates plummet in Sunderland during the summer has moved indoors for the winter.
The travelling club for teenagers has been running at the A690 Youth Initiative wing at the Sandhill Centre, Grindon, for the past three weeks and is already proving a success, attracting 120 teenagers every Friday night.
The events are designed to bring activities to young people to prevent them hanging around on street corners and being tempted into antisocial behaviour.
Lee Ferry, project manager at the A690 Youth Initiative, said: "It's going brilliantly. I did not think as many people would come to the winter events, but we have got 120 coming on a Friday night which is just phenomenal."
The winter events include all sorts of activities, from a games area including a Wii console to a DJ/MC area, with a football cage and caravan offering health advice placed outside.
The activities vary on a weekly basis and fitness sessions and street dancing start soon.
The events have been made possible by a group of young people aged 13 to 16 who applied for 35,000 from the Youth Opportunity Fund.
The fund is managed by Sunderland City Council's children's services department, with the grants being allocated by a group of youth advocates.
Lee said the secret to the events' success is giving young people what they want.
He said: "The young people from the summer wanted to move it indoors. They did the application and got the money and decide how they want it to be spent."
The events operate a strict no-alcohol and drugs policy and have stringent safety measures, including a metal detector and a photo ID system, which ensures young people register for the events beforehand and get parental consent.
In the summer, the events – which attracted 175 to 200 young people per night – were held at outdoor sites in Grindon and Farringdon and saw disorder rates on Thursdays to Sundays plummet by 34 per cent on the same period the year before.
The 13-week pilot programme started in July last year and in that time there were no Antisocial Behaviour Orders (Asbos) given out on the estates around where the events took place.
The project also aims to get young people involved in positive activities on other days of the week.
Numbers attending youth club sessions at Grindon Young People's Centre on Monday and Wednesday nights have gone from just four or five to 60 or 70, thanks to the success of the summer events.
The winter events will be held at the Sandhill Centre until the middle of March, when they will move to Thorney Close Action and Enterprise Centre.
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Weather for Sunderland
Saturday 04 February 2012
Today
Light sleet showers
Temperature: -1 C to 2 C
Wind Speed: 18 mph
Wind direction: South
Tomorrow
Sunny spells
Temperature: 1 C to 6 C
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