Blackwood Youth Action community group opens up youth space in Bridgetown

A new creative and supportive space for youth in the South West has been opened to much fanfare, featuring content creation and craft spaces as well as support services. The Blackwood Youth Action community group celebrated the opening of the Youth Space in Bridgetown earlier this month. The Youth Space will allow young people in the Warren-Blackwood area to get support and have a place to relax in. The new space is in the former officer-in-charge residential building next to the Bridgetown Police Station and has facilities including a counselling room and an office for staff. It also features a gaming room fitted with a painted green screen for content creation, along with a crafting space as well. BYA chief executive Lisa Burgess, chair Sarah Youngson and member for Warren-Blackwood Jane Kelsbie addressed the crowd at the celebrations, before the official ribbon-cutting ceremony, sausage sizzle and a tour of the building. Ms Youngson said the centre would allow the BYA to have an office to work from, while also providing a space for youth to get support. “What we’re wanting to do is have this be our head office, so we’ll do our work and admin here,” she said. “We also have a space for counselling where we can do some therapeutic work, we’ve got a kitchen where kids can come for a feed at any time and we’ll be doing some cooking lessons, so they can make meals for the community. “We also have a makers’ space and a gym.” She said meeting the needs of youth in the area was a priority with the space. “We’re trying to meet the diverse needs of young people so that they all feel like they have a cool place to hang out and get support if they need it.” “We do a lot of mental health programs across the whole Warren-Blackwood district, so we want to keep growing that and providing services to young people at risk.” Ms Kelsbie said she was proud of the work BYA had done advocating for government funding for the space and for mental health services in the region. “I think Blackwood Youth Action group have worked incredibly hard advocating to get not only a youth space, but the services they can deliver from this space is outstanding and I’m really proud to work alongside them to advocate for government funding,” she said. “I think having mental health support in regional communities is also really important and organisations like BYA, where it’s youth-led and youth co-designed, are really important.” “I think we have good mental health services in regional WA but places like this that are embedded in the community are incredible and I do think it’s a great model as well.