Co-op provides a place to go for kids in city's core

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The old, brick building is at the south end of Saskatoon's Avenue B. It used to be an electrical building for the city. Some of its windows are boarded up, but it works just fine as home of the Core Neighbourhood Youth Co-op (CNYC).

Inside, roughly 15 young children, some wearing festive party hats, are either scampering around the old furniture and tables, throwing balloons of all colours in the air and trying to hit at them with their hands, or absorbed in their pop, chips and hot dogs. Volunteers are hunched over, painting flowers and suns on the children's faces or transforming them into cats, dogs or turtles.

"Who wants a hot dog?" calls out a woman who is overseeing the cooking on a decades old stove. She is Nancy Domoter, operations director at CNYC, although her tenure ended officially Thursday, Jan. 13, which is why there is a party going on. She'd been in the position since spring of 2003. Children constantly run up to her, exclaiming, "Look at my face!" or "I'll have one!" After receiving his hot dog, one youngster proclaims, "Yummy, yummy, it's going down my tummy!"

The CNYC serves the five core neighbourhoods in Saskatoon that lie west of the Saskatchewan River, an area with which Domoter is familiar. Her previous work with the department of Justice had brought her into the same neighbourhood. She'd even worked with some of the same kids.

"I wanted to get back in touch with the grassroots," she said,, explaining why she left her other job and came to CNYC.

The co-op is open to all youth from age five to 18. The majority of them-Domoter's estimate is between 80 and 85 per cent-are Aboriginal. She says CNYC also works with a lot of refugees and immigrants.

The program is run almost entirely by volunteers, aside from Domoter and one other staff member. Domoter says there's a "pretty huge volunteer base" that includes community members and students doing practicums to be youth care or social workers. There are also nursing students who are enrolled in the International Nursing course who help out.

The program keeps afloat with funding from the departments of Industry and Resources and Community Resources and Employment and from other co-operatives.

The older youth at the CNYC earn wages for the jobs they do. They also sell some of their projects at the local farmer's market and do odd jobs, like snow shovelling or yard work. They make compost bins and have learned the art of vermicomposting, which uses red wiggler worms. They also deliver Planet S, a bi-weekly Saskatoon newspaper, and put up posters for organizations like the Saskatchewan Native Theatre Company. Once a week, the youth also clean toys at Department of Community Resources and Employment offices.

Morningstar Cappo has been attending the CNYC since she was 12. "It's somewhere to hang out," explained the 16-year-old. "It keeps me out of trouble."

She has made compost bins, as well as delivered papers and put up posters. She has also worked on bikes in the co-op bike shop, where youth repair donated bikes to use or sell.

Cappo said she's made a lot of friends through CNYC. That may be because a lot of children have attended. Between September 2003 and March 2004, there were around 160 different youth participating in the program's activities.

Some of those activities will be changing soon. Domoter says the co-op is moving away from focusing on the younger kids with its after school program that includes activities like arts and crafts and games. CNYC will instead focus more on youth 12 and up, particularly with the project NuHorizons, which looks at employment creation through facilitating business venture opportunities and developing employability skills among marginalized youth between 16 and 24.