Agenda item

Monica Bergh provided a presentation to the Board on the Mama Bee Project. Amber Preen (Director of Mama Bee) was also available to answer questions. The Youth Centre had not been operating as normal due to some challenges to manage behaviour and also staffing issues. There were also issues in Chesham that needed to be addressed relating to exploitation of young people.

There were a number of projects operating in Chesham such as working with the theatre and also with LEAP on a Sportivate project which aimed to help bring community cohesion to Chesham, bringing people from different backgrounds together with sustainable sporting activities. Chesham Youth Council were also working in partnership with the Terence Higgins Trust to provide a C-Card walk-in centre for young people and sexual health support. Switch Bucks also provided support for alcohol and substance addiction and support for family and friends and the TreeHouse Project helped young people with mental health issues. Monica commented that it was key that all these projects were co-ordinated to maximum advantage for Chesham youth. There had been discussions about smaller groups of young people meeting in the Bagnall Centre initially.

The Vice-Chairman reported that she had been appointed on the Chesham Youth Club Management Committee and welcomed meeting with Amber, Monica and Colin regarding future ideas. Alison Piriouet who had undertaken great work for the  Management Committee had now retired. The Vice-Chairman thanked Alison for her service to the Committee.

Amber reported that she had submitted some proposals to the Board on bringing services together and engaging young people. Chesham was not exclusive in the fact that there was a reduction in the provision of services for 13-19 year olds and there was a lack of support and training for volunteers. Her proposal was to have a detached 12-week project to re-establish relationships with young people and to break down barriers to engagement. This could lead to drawing them back to the Centre which could then be used in a safe way as a positive engagement space. Working with the other projects mentioned above could also help engagement and expanding services to include careers advice and help with wellbeing. Match funding was available.

The Chairman asked about services in the villages and Monica commented that young people did travel to Chesham for services which also helped with social isolation. The detached project could also be extended to the villages as well. A Member commented that young people could be reliant on parents to bring them into towns as there was no public transport outside school buses. An outreach service in the villages would be helpful. Monica reported that the initial project would focus on Chesham to try and address some of the challenging issues being experienced. Colin reported that the Oasis Partnership did have access to a minibus which was lottery funded but funding for fuel would be required.

Members noted that Newtown Family Centre were running sessions on how to build confidence and self-esteem with a four week course starting week commencing 26 September. A place could be booked by emailing earlyhelpduty@buckinghamshire.gov.uk. The Centre could also help with any small group work.

The Vice-Chairman reported that this work presented an opportunity for resetting services for young people and the opening of the Youth Centre. She referred to diversionary programmes which the legacy District Council used to run which had been successful. The detached project in collaboration with other projects and partnership work would help deal with a mix of different issues and understanding the landscape. Once the project was underway a presentation could be made to the Chesham Villages Forum.

The Chairman thanked Monica and Amber and the support of partners in this exciting project.