YouthGrow: developing community with youth through employment.

• Author: Milner, Vaughan
• Position: Policy Development Papers

Abstract

Meaningful employment for youth on the margins of society is difficult to find and hard to sustain in the market-driven economy. This paper describes the development of a job creation programme called YouthGrow in Dunedin, New Zealand. The programme provides jobs for 16-24 year olds who fall between training and employment because of social disadvantage or poor mental health. The struggles of these youth are paralleled by the challenges encountered in the development of the programme. The paper identifies the theoretical and social drivers of the programme and explores the potential for third sector, Government and community partnerships to work together for sustainable local change.

INTRODUCTION

Like many seemingly simple ideas, the development of YouthGrow has unfolded in a complex way. This complexity reflects the challenges posed by unemployment, mental illness and being young in today's world. The struggle to belong and be part of the community, with a role and place, is not new. What is new is the lack of consistent engagement by the broader community and officials with the waste and invisibility of people on the margins.

Those of us who grew up in the middle of the 20th century often joked about the seemingly endless supply of strangely defined jobs in government departments like the Ministry of Works, Railways or Post Office. However, the restructuring and downsizing of such organisations in the 1990s has left the country better off economically and worse off socially. With hindsight it is evident that such organisations provided many people with a start in the workforce and the allied opportunity to contribute to the community through a sense of role and purpose. Equally, government departments retained many people in jobs who would have struggled in the harsh, casualised employment market of today.

YouthGrow is a turn-of-the-century response to the voices of young foodbank clients in Dunedin and to the concern of North Dunedin Presbyterian parishes for the future of their young. When these young people were asked to voice their dream they said "paid work". This straightforward and heartfelt reply encouraged the emergence of a curious mix of church, community and state interests that have found common and fertile ground to work together on the YouthGrow project.

SOWING THE SEED

In 1999, Presbyterian Support Otago embarked on a series of meetings with Presbyterian ministers in Dunedin. The aim of the meetings was to explore whether parishes and the social service arm of the organisation could identify areas of potential shared concern or joint work. At a meeting at Ross Home in Dunedin's Northeast Valley during September 1999, a theme emerged around the issues of unemployment and poor mental health visible amongst young people in the Northeast and Leith Valley areas of the city. At around the same time staff at Presbyterian Support Otago's foodbank in the central city had been researching ways of responding more proactively to the large numbers of unemployed and unwell young men who drifted in and out of the service. In addition to surveying the young men, the organisation joined in commissioning research with Corpac, a budget service for people with mental illness. The resulting literature review and the views of the youth were unanimous that paid work was the best response to the issues facing the youth (University of Otago Consulting Group 1999).

This information provided the basis for a subsequent discussion held at the Presbyterian Support Centre in downtown Dunedin during November 1999. Participants in this meeting included the Minister of Leith Presbyterian Church, and the CEO and Directors of Family and Community Services and Fundraising, from Presbyterian Support Otago.

Participants explored ways of creating paid work for youth through purchasing or establishing a labor-intensive business. The possibility of funding a feasibility study through an organisation called the Council for World Mission was identified. A suitable consultant experienced in economic and business development who happened to be a parishioner from the local Knox church was retained to carry out the study. After the terms of reference were agreed, a funding application for the feasibility study was lodged and what eventually became known as the YouthGrow project was underway.

TURNING WHAT'S FEASIBLE TO SOMETHING ACHIEVABLE--WATER TO WINE

An advisory group was formed in order to oversee the feasibility study and provide diverse input to the thinking and operationalising of the project. Original membership consisted of three representatives from the Knox Presbyterian Church, one from the Leith Valley Presbyterian Church, a community employment advisor from the Community Employment Group of the Department of Work and Income, the consultant who was conducting the feasibility study, and three representatives from the Family and Community Services area of Presbyterian Support Otago, including the Director of Family and Community Services, who was the convener of the Advisory Group.

The feasibility study took two months to complete. During this time, the vague concept of creating jobs turned into a substantive proposal to develop a land-based business that could employ up to 24 youth. The land-based theme appealed because of its commercial possibilities and the therapeutic potential of healthy outdoor activity and work with the soil (Fieldhouse 2003, Soderback et al. 2004). It was at this point that the complexity of the planning process started to emerge. The first challenge was to find a suitable business venture, while at the same time engaging potential stakeholders who might also be funders.

Developing an operational business plan while simultaneously obtaining resource consent for establishing the business under the Resource Management Act 1991 added to the complexity. These intermingled strands of activity were to occupy the advisory group, particularly the Director of Family and Community Services of Presbyterian Support Otago and the consultant, in more than 85 meetings over the next two years, culminating in the opening of YouthGrow for business on 28th October 2001. In addition to those with a direct involvement, the development process had drawn in members of the community in which the venture was located, the landowner, and a range of officials and others connected with the city and regional councils.

PRINCIPLES TO PRACTICE

The course of action that created YouthGrow reflects the principles embedded within community development processes of social production (Rubin and Rubin 2001), the politics of transformation (Munford and Walsh-Tapiata 2001), social action (Milner 2004) and the relational/dialogical (Burkett 2001). The emphasis was on concrete action...