“This is a place where they belong,” said branch director Shellica Trevino. “A lot of the kids have come for several years, and this has become like a second home to them.”
The truth is the same good work going on in the Lacey club day in and day out, is happening across this county in other Boys & Girls Club facilities.
It’s hard to believe, but it was 10 years ago this month when community residents, led by auto dealer Steve Boone, came together to open the first club in a former bus barn adjacent to Tumwater High School. In the last decade, the organization has opened three other clubs – one each in Lacey, Olympia and Rochester.
It’s a success story that merits community applause.
The Tumwater club, still in its original location, serves about 200 kids a day.
Rochester, which recently received a $200,000 safety grant to pave the parking lot and make other improvements, serves about 75 children a day. “We’re serving more kids than we’ve ever had there before,” said Joe Ingoglia, executive director of the Thurston County clubs.
The Olympia program is operated out of Jefferson Middle School, but this year expanded to serve students from Garfield Elementary. About 70 youngsters participate in the program on an average day.
At all the clubs, students find multiple athletic programs to take advantage of, along with social activities and help with their homework. There’s usually a snack available before mom or dad pick them up on the way home from work.
“But the secret,” Ingoglia said, “is the fact Boys & Girls Club is a guidance-based program designed as a recreation program.”
South Sound families are struggling to keep a roof over the head of their children and food on the table. Parents are working long hours to make ends meet and the kids, if not for the clubs, would be left on their own after school. That’s a recipe for trouble.
“We have thousands and thousands of kids in the county who need another positive, caring, adult role model in their lives. And that’s what Boys & Girls Clubs offer,” Ingoglia said.
When early supporters first suggested starting a club in South Sound they were met with some skepticism by folks who said this is not a poor community where a club could serve a real social purpose. “You don’t think of our community as a needy environment. Then you find out there are something like 450 homeless kids in the Olympia School District alone,” Ingoglia said.
He came to Thurston County as the executive director in 2006, having directed Bellingham’s program for four years and running clubs in Germany before that.
“What I learned is this is a remarkably generous community environment where people are incredibly committed to making the place where we live a better place. That never fails to knock me off my feet,” Ingoglia said.
That caring community will be able to show its appreciation for the Boys & Girls Clubs and its 10-year track record of saving and transforming young lives when the club formally kicks off its $5.95 million fundraising campaign to build a 20,000 square foot club at Garfield Elementary. The capital committee and board members have already donated $940,000 in seed money, and the goal is to have most of the money either in hand or in pledges before the program breaks ground in early 2013.
Club officials have turned bus barns and other facilities into functioning clubs, but this will be the first opportunity to build a club from the ground up.
Boys & Girls Clubs of Thurston County has been a big success because nobody has told the kids that the places they go to have fun and spend time with friends is really about building their character and giving them the tools they need to be productive and caring adults.
