Activist to speak about recreation opportunities
Published 9:39 pm Monday, February 4, 2019
A group of downtown residents plans to appear at this week’s City Council meeting to make its case for more recreation for young people downtown.
Community activist Akoma Love said she works with the young people in the Wellons Street area, and they don’t have anything to do when they are not in school.
“There is nothing more urgent than this right now, because our children are getting in trouble,” Love said. “We have to bring this into the light.”
Love lamented the fact that Birdsong Recreation Center was demolished in 2005 and has not been replaced by a recreational center for young people on the west side of downtown. Locations on the east side of town, like the East Suffolk Recreation Center and the Salvation Army’s Robert W. Harrell Jr. Physical Health and Education Center, are too far away, she said.
“The youth are concerned, parents are concerned,” Love said.
The “Supreme Save Our Youth Group” has been meeting at Morgan Memorial Library, Love said. She has her eye on a house on Wellons Street that she hopes the group can acquire and make into a recreation center, or hopes the city can do so on their behalf.
She also advocates for a new downtown library, saying Morgan Memorial Library is run down, and said that when a new library is built, Morgan Memorial should be revamped for an activity center for the young people.
Wednesday’s meeting begins at 7 p.m. in City Council chambers, 442 W. Washington St.