Elm Street Neighborhood Center
Services to Empower a Community
This community-based youth services program site took off
like a rocket when it opened in September 2006. It is funded
in part by the US Department of Justice Weed and Seed program,
and operates as the Safe Haven for the Yonkers 3rd precinct
in the Nodine Hill neighborhood. The program has attracted
more than 200 local youth, including homeless youth in Westhab's
scattered site emergency housing program and permanently
housed youth living in poverty. Program staff empower the
children and their families to make the Center their space
and it has quickly involved into a full service community
safe haven.
School-age
youth who use the Center have access to comprehensive academic,
enrichment, and recreational services similar to those of
the Coachman Family Center, as well as several programs
customized for the community setting, including two evidence-based
youth programs which add key critically important elements
to our menu of programming: 1) In partnership with Big Brothers
Big Sisters of Family Services of Westchester, youth receive
screened and trained mentors, which encourages the positive
lessons imparted to the young people at the Center to continue
in their daily community life. 2) In partnership with Andrus
Children's Center we offer Strengthening Families, a proven,
successful program in which middle-school-age children and
their parents build protective factors against substance
abuse and other social ills into their family life.
The
Elm Street Neighborhood Center has also brought The Youth
and Police Initiative Training!, a regionally tested
model to build trust and communication between local police
officers and at-risk adolescents to Yonkers. Youth and police
officers teach each other about their lives and engage in
trust-building activities to foster improved community relations.
Programming doesn't stop at the door. Youth from the Elm
Street Neighborhood Center worked with a Westchester Arts
Council artist to create an imaginative sculptured back
wall for a public playground for toddlers on Elm Street
-another safe and positive space in the neighborhood that
Westhab built for children and families.
The
youth at the Elm Street Neighborhood Center are setting
the bar for their community. The teens have become bona
fide community leaders- mentoring younger children, engaging
in community service, and organizing their own Youth Council.
The Elm Street Neighborhood Center provides the tools and
support for these young people to reach their goals. As
they embrace the positive, strength-based values of the
Center, and gain self-confidence as they see themselves
succeed, they are making the future bright in Nodine Hill.
