Residents voice concerns over youth cafe plans (From Darlington and Stockton Times)

Residents voice concerns over youth cafe plans

1:24pm Friday 30th July 2010

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PLANS for a youth café for Ingleby Barwick will be considered by councillors next week.

The £300,000 café is intended to give teenagers a place to socialise safely and will be housed in a new extension to the community centre on the town’s Beckfields estate.

The centre is already home to a youth club, but it desperately needs more space.

But residents have objected on the grounds that they believe anti-social behaviour problems will get worse.

Stockton Borough Council has worked with local councillors to come up with a design for the extension and the young people will decide what their centre will need.

Ingleby Barwick residents have complained in the past because of a lack of facilities for children and young people.

In response, the borough council opened Romano Park last year for younger children, and it is hoped the youth café will provide somewhere for the teenagers of the town to go.

The youth club can run on only three evenings a week owing to sharing the community centre with other groups.

It offers everything from pool to Wii games, arts and crafts and cooking, as well as cricket.

New DJ decks were recently purchased by the youth club for members to use.

But some residents in Haresfield Way and surrounding streets have raised objections to the proposed youth café.

Marina Dale said: “Over the years, we have been totally tortured during the summer months and school holidays.

“We have constant groups of youths on the green playing football, and on a night, sitting on the green carrying on.

“They kick the ball over our garden wall and either unlock the gate to retrieve it or bang on the front door.

“We constantly pick up pizza boxes or drink cans. Over the past two years, we have had the pleasure of the youths who congregate in the community car park in the early hours of the morning to either practise skidding or test out their music.”

Other residents complained about anti-social behaviour and suggested some supervision or the site being fenced off.

The plans will be considered by the planning committee on Wednesday.

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