Call to dig deep for Youthtown

By TOM CLARKE

CORPORATE Auckland must do more to help to fund Youthtown's work with the city's young people, says its new executive director Jeremy Sutton-Pratt.

The Auckland-based organisation provides recreational, social and educational programmes and facilities for young people.

Last year, Mr Sutton-Pratt says, city-based corporates provided just over 1 per cent of Youthtown's budget, but they are about to be hit for more.

"Something that I find slightly curious is that everyone says Youthtown is wonderful and how much the city needs us, but they don't always dig very deeply in their pockets to make it happen," he says.

"A lot of people assume that we get government funding, but we don't - all our funding is self-generated. We do get good support from the Auckland City Council which provides about 15 per cent of our income, but that still leaves the other 85 per cent that we have to find."

Mr Sutton-Pratt is passionate about the work the organisation does "because we're talking about the future of the city's young people. While there are all sorts of things that are tremendously important, I actually feel that kids are probably at the top of the list.

"I find it curious that in 1999 we only received some $11,000 from the corporate sector - that's not very much from the greater Auckland business community."

The organisation has two new fund-raising plans to change that and Mr Sutton-Pratt says that if Youthtown can provide the supportive environment to help young people to develop into well-grounded and secure adults, "they're going to become much better employees in the future."

Youthtown's first satellite centre in Glen Innes is to be expanded, with the involvement of the local college, the Department of Education and the city council. Once that is fully developed, Mr Sutton-Pratt says, it will form the blueprint for similar developments elsewhere in Auckland.

Mr Sutton-Pratt has a background in fund-raising for charity organisations here and in England.

He came here in 1974 and worked for the Red Cross as director of fund-raising. On returning to Britain in 1984, he worked for various charity groups for the next 13 years, including stints as fund-raiser with the Arthritis Research Campaign and the British Epilepsy Association. He returned to New Zealand in 1997 and joined Youthtown as fund-raising manager.

Part of his work at Youthtown has been the creation of the Youthtown Foundation to build up an endowment fund, predominately from legacies, to help to secure the long-term future of the organisation and to assist in its growth.

Youthtown began as Boystown in 1932 as a boxing club and soup kitchen for homeless and underprivileged boys. When it began catering for girls it changed its name in the mid-80s.