GROUP GROUP YOUTH SOCIETY OF PINCHER CREEK

ANNUAL GENERAL MEETING

MARCH 11, 2024

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EXECUTIVE DIRECTOR'S REPORT 
 

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Good afternoon everyone! It is the 37 th Annual General Meeting of the Group Group Youth Society that you have joined us for today.  Yes, it was back in February of 1987 that our drop-in centre became incorporated under the Society’s Act of Alberta. A few years later, in 1994, we became a registered charity under the Federal Income Tax Act. For all those years GGY has been active in the community providing programming and support for local youngsters.

 

Again for 2023, approximately half of our operating budget came from Family and Community Support Services. FCSS funding has been crucial for our operations since our incorporation. That support is so
greatly appreciated.

Funds from The Joint Committee, Municipal District and Town of Pincher Creek, provided $3,000.00 for
a special project, to further develop our Career and Employment Opportunities program. Our Youth
Program Worker, Liane, did a great job of researching and developing resources to be used with our CEO
participants.

Support from various local organizations and businesses is so important to our youth programming. It’s
been the Rotary Club, the United Church Pastoral Charge, TransCanada Pipelines and Pieridae that have
made major projects like the new pool table and skateboard ramp recovering a possibility for us.
Groups like the Carol Festival Committee and the Livingstone Ladies Social Club gave other special
projects that extra boost!

Our last Casino Event, in the fall of 2021, brought us well over $30,000.00 to support staffing and
renovations as well as youth programming. Just recently it was announced that we have been
scheduled for another event sooner than expected. This coming July 29 th and 30 th will find Group Group
Youth volunteers putting in time again at Casino Lethbridge.

Again, in 2023, GGY partnered with Community Safety Net. This organization promotes a “safety
awareness and educational initiative that creates a network of concerned individuals who want to
protect children and save lives” throughout Canada and the USA. Many local businesses donated
towards the printing of dozens of Drug Safety books to be distributed to our members and other
youngsters in the community.

Our RCMP Liaison Project saw Board Member, Will Feran, spend an hour or so with the kids most weeks
through our Gym & Field Program. During the winter months he met us at the Town Hall gymnasium.
During the summer months we would more likely be found at a local park.

The Peace Crane Project helped our kids get a feel for that bigger world out there. After folding origami
cranes, and writing messages of hope and peace on their wings, our group exchanged cranes with a class
of youngsters in Italy and with others from a library in the USA. Our Jr. Staff member, Sara, entered a
special contest where she placed “runner-up” in the “Smallest Peace Crane in the World” contest. We
were thrilled to have a celebrity of such world-wide fame in our midst.

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Our sponsored child, in Nicaragua, is now ten years old now. We have helped support him, through
Children Believe, for over five years now. (Approximately a dollar a day from our “in-house” concession
goes to help purchase food, clothes, etc. for Joshua.) Our youth members help with preparing cards
and letters to send to Joshua – another way to bring a little more of the world in through our Drop-In
doors.

And here are a few more stats!! Over the twelve months of 2023, the recorded visits from our youth
members totaled 1,383. (Visits during 2022 recorded at 1,375.) The number of individual youngsters
who came through our doors over the past year totaled 113. (Individual youngsters recorded as
attending the Centre in 2022 were 102.) Again for 2023, by far the largest percentage of our attendees
were between 10 and 15 years of age.

And, yes, I was the one full-time employee during the year. We did not receive funding for a summer
student so that made July and August even busier than usual for regular staff. Liane was scheduled for a
weekly shift on Tuesday afternoons to organize arts/crafts/photography projects throughout the year.
However, she and her husband, Roland, very capably helped out with various extra tasks and projects –
quite often on a volunteer basis.

And, talking about volunteers, I would like to say a very special “Thank you” to the members of our
Board. You are such an essential part of our organization. Our Centre just wouldn’t be here without
you. All that time put in checking the emails, arranging to attend meetings and working on special
projects is very much appreciated!

Now, we already have a good start on 2024. With a little more funding for staffing this year I am looking
forward to that extra help with so many projects. Keeping our ten raised garden beds producing well
again will require some serious attention. We already have the funds in place to re-do our skateboard
ramp. With what remains of our last Casino proceeds, we will be repair/replace some windows in our
building and put up more fencing to keep basketballs of the streets. Yes, it will be another busy year.
Stay tuned as the months go by!

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Lynne Teneycke
Executive Director

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