CIRCLEVILLE – Foundations4Youth Receives a 400 dollar donation from Corky Que Barbecue and Eagles. The Eagles recently had a BBQ cook off event at their lot in Circleville, Corky Que was one of the winners and decided to donate the winnings of 200 dollars to Foundation4Youth, the Eagles decided to match that amount in support of the community.
Corky Que is a mobile BBQ caterer based out of Chillicothe that specializes in smoked and BBQ meats. Recently Featured on the Cooking channel for their “Three Little Pigs sandwich” — it’s an egg and cheese sandwich with bacon, ham, and sausage. “We decided to give our winning to the foundation because we want to support a group that’s supporting the future here in Circleville, said Corky Q Barbecue.”
“I work at Foundations every other week,” said Stacia Bauman Champlain at the Eagles. “These kids have come such a long ways in the short time since foundations has been in operation. The kids see us open up immediately now and tell the staff how they are doing and if they had a good day or a bad day. We are able to love on these kids, feed them and send them home knowing they will have a better week because on Tuesday nights.”
Foundations4youth photo, Stacia Bauman from Eagles in Background
Foundations4Youth was serving up Pumpkin Pancakes on tuesday night, and writing sentimental statements on Pumpkins. The usual activities were games, colorings, sports in the PICCA front yard and hanging out.
Foundations4Youth launched in March of 2018, a collaboration of Pickaway Area Recovery Services, Circleville City Schools, the Circleville Police Department, and the Faith Based Community will be launching a non-profit organization titled Foundations4Youth on April 3rd, 2018 that will feature an accompanying youth drop-in center in Circleville. The project, in its entirety, aims to be a unified effort with local businesses, faith based entities, schools, and community based organizations (CBO’s) in providing a non-profit and safe, drop-in center for area youth. Foundations4Youth is locally funded through donations which shows how important this is to the community.
“This past fall, leaders from the Pickaway Area Recovery Services (PARS), Circleville City Schools, and Circleville Police Department held ongoing discussions of how we could create more opportunity to impact the lives of Circleville youth,” said Circleville Chief of Police Shawn Baer. “Our discussions identified obstacles, a wealth of available resources, and positive opportunities unique to our city. At the conclusion of our discussion we determined that our goals were actionable and simple. We needed to find tangible ways that the youth would be motivated to immediately spend time with law enforcement, PARS staff, school staff, and faith based community volunteers so that we could mentor them, provide character building opportunities, and plug them into all the resources available to them in our community.”
Barry Bennett, Executive Director of Pickaway Area Recovery Services (PARS), said “We know that there is a need for our community to provide quality activities for children. Our goal is to work with activities and groups already in place and to support them by providing a connection between them all with Foundations4Youth. We have seen strong community support since we started working on this last year and it is obvious that the center is needed and will have substantial local support. I also serve as the Chaplain of the Circleville Police Department and through this relationship PARS has provided services that previously were not available to the Police Department. Through partnership we can accomplish great things and that is a core value that will make Foundations4Youth successful.”
Superintendent of Circleville City Schools Jonathan Davis said, “The youth are the greatest asset in our community and we greatly appreciate the hard work put in by the Circleville Police Department and Pickaway Area Recovery Services to open a positive center for youth development.”
The center, located at 457 E. Ohio St, will be open on Tuesday’s from 3-9 p.m. to start and as additional funds and volunteers become available the center will be open additional days. It will be staffed by background checked community volunteers and support agencies. School age children 5 to 19 years of age are welcome to attend the center where tutoring, homework assistance, snacks, TV, gaming, wi-fi, and phone charging stations will be provided with the intention of adding job skill development and scheduled crafts in the coming summer months.
“Our children are the future of our community,” continued Chief Baer. “Investing in them makes a stronger Circleville. “While this center is only the start of a much larger, comprehensive youth-based initiative, we are excited to see our vision from this past fall come to fruition April 3rd.”
Transportation and busing will be provided throughout the time the center is open.
Members of the public who are interested in providing assistance to the program in the form of volunteering or donations or to get additional information please email [email protected] or call 740-500-4082 for more information.
