Help Build a Youth Center

I’ve always dreamed about building a youth center. Since I’ve arrived in Eastern Montana, it has become painfully obvious that there is not enough for students to do. That is one reason that Montana has one of the highest underage drinking rates in the nation and Eastern Montana leads the state of Montana. In my town there is literally no where for students to hang out that is geared for them. There’s only one restaurant that is open all night and it’s more of a mom and pop restaurant and you have to be quiet and sit. There is a coffee shop here, BUT it is only open to 6pm…which still baffles me!

Anyway, so with this great need and my long time dream, I’ve been hoping that something might fall together for a possible youth center. The first indication of this possibility was a lot of comments from people that agree with the need.

BUT, the BIGGEST and most concrete door opened today when the building below was presented to me:

This building sits right across from the highschool and it has a large gravel parking lot. The upper building is empty and has no utilities. The lower one has full utilities. It is currently owned by the local community college and they are more than willing to sell and love the idea. They would be willing to sell these buildings to us for $25,000. Anybody knows that buildings of this size at this location that is also on the Main street should sell more than this. It’s a little neglected and we would need more to fix it up and get it going but this is the first step.

The basic idea right now is that the bottom one would be turned into a late night coffee shop/concert venue with plenty of hangout space (there’s a bottom floor as well and we could put in a second floor). Then, POSSIBLY, the upper building would be made available to a local organization trying to build a skate park (still waiting to connect with them on it).

This is still only a possibility…but the only thing I could think of doing right now was post this and see if I could get support from the online community in making this dream possible. I’ve included a PayPal donation button in the right column that links directly to our youth ministries checking account. I’m just waiting to see what happens and I’ll keep everyone posted. Thanks and please spread the word if you believe in this (you can either Tweet, Share on Facebook, ReBlog this on Tumblr, or whatever other medium you choose to use).