THUNDER BAY — The Boys and Girls Clubs of Thunder Bay hosted its 33rd open house last week and thanked the community for its support in helping the club to provide many services for area children.
Albert Aiello, the club's founder and executive director who also serves as a city councillor for the McIntyre Ward, said the club has grown exponentially over the years along with its programming, which is designed to meet the needs of today's youths.
"When I started it back in 1991 (our open house) was about introducing the community to the Boys and Girls Club. We didn't have a lot of kids and we were in the East End," Aiello said. "It was stigmatized to some extent, so I started this open house, closed off all the streets, and I brought in carnival activities and we had a big festival. The intent at that time was to advertise that the Boys and Girls Club was a great place to be and a safe place for kids.
The group has since relocated to the former Forest Park School where many children use the centre year round. Aiello said open houses are now twice a year, to wrap up the summer and another in the winter to thank its many sponsors.
Additions to the club included a mobile skate park that they acquired in the early 2000s to meet the needs of the popular sport across the city.
"We were the first group to have it, and we were able to expand our programming. We worked very closely with municipal recreation and we went to a lot of the community centres, which had flat paved surfaces where we could set up our ramps," he said, adding these are professional solid steel skateboard ramps.
During the open house last week, the club sold the skateboard equipment to Cinema 5 Skate Park at a "drastically reduced price."
"We wanted to make sure that it gets used and now a fledging partnership has formed," Aiello said.
"(Cinema 5 Skate Park staff were here at our open house providing skateboarding instructions to children during our open house and this is really the first step.
Now we're going to move all this equipment over there and we're looking forward to more kids using it under their supervision to ensure that it's safe."
The Chronicle Journal / Local Journalism Initiative
