The Rotary clubs of Chester, Deep River, and Essex have been awarded a Rotary District Managed Grant from Rotary District 7980 to furnish and refurbish a community room at Tri-Town Youth Services Bureau (TTYSB). TTYSB provides services to families and youth of all ages from Chester, Deep River, and Essex to promote wellness and mental health to enable youth to develop productive relationships with their family, school, peers, and the broader community.

The goal of this grant is to develop a versatile room that will be suitable for programming for all ages. The room being redesigned was previously outfitted for preschool with a colorful wall mural and tiny furniture. However, preschool services have not been active in recent years and the organization’s focus has shifted to programs for teens and school-age children. Youth programs, including youth leadership, mentoring, prevention work, and restorative practices, are currently held in a boardroom due to a lack of a usable site.

The new room will have family-room atmosphere with two couches, portable tables, a flat screen TV, fresh paint including a chalkboard wall for creative expression, rows of magnetic strips for displaying artwork, and a parent resource library relocated to a hallway alcove. The comfortable and comforting setting of this room will be conducive to establishing the positive rapport that is so essential to effective services. Another important improvement is that the new room will allow the recommended circle-format for discussion, desired for most programs and especially vital for restorative work with challenged youth.

Meetings of UConn Extension’s People Empowering People, a supportive group for parents; of Girls Circle and other mentoring groups; and of varied activities and programs for the Substance Abuse Prevention Coalition will also benefit from the new room. TTYSB Executive Director Allison Abramson was recently elected to serve on the board of the Connecticut Youth Services Association, so this project will benefit that expanded role as well.

Rotarians from all three clubs were involved in the labor of this project, with all clubs participating in the painting projects and Chester Rotarian Ron Woodward providing the carpentry work for the new library. Simply Sharing, a nonprofit organization run by Essex Rotarian Alison Brinkmann, is contributing several of the big furniture items needed for this project. An open house is planned to showcase the new room at the conclusion of the project.

Chester Rotary authored the grant and is serving as the lead club on this project coordinating the work and budget, but all three clubs are equal partners supporting the cost of this project, with Rotary District 7980 matching the funds contributed by the clubs. District supported grants must fit one of Rotary’s six areas of focus, but in the case of this project, due to the vital services provided by TTYSB, multiple areas of focus are served: basic education and literacy with mentorship and other programs to foster success in school, maternal and child health with parent and new mom programming, disease prevention and treatment with substance abuse prevention programming, and peace and conflict resolution with restorative programming for youth conflict resolution.

The Rotary motto for 2018-’19 of “Be the inspiration” fits this project well. Rotarians hope that this example of community generosity will reassure our youth that their community cares about them and believes in their future, which hopefully, will inspire our youth to give their best in return.