Vision. Mission. Hope. Community.
Those words get tossed around frequently, but it also takes funding – money – to bring those words to life.
The Boys & Girls Club of North Central North Carolina has served thousands of young people in its almost 10 years of existence. BGCNCNC has the vision to help young people, the mission to provide support to those who need it most. The hope for bright futures and a strong community remain priorities in the five counties that it serves.
And now, some community supporters and benefactors have pledged some substantial amounts of money to help renovate club space in Granville and Vance counties. And BGCNCNC leaders hope to reach a goal of $100,000 by Dec. 31 to be able to start the first phase of a four-part, $5 million renovation of its space in Oxford.
Chief Operations Officer Jacqueline Robinson spoke with John C. Rose on Tuesday’s Town Talk about several recent developments in the cash flow department.
The most recent comes from The Goodwill Foundation, longtime BGCNCNC partners. Robinson said it will give $100,000 to the Granville unit and $50,000 to the Vance unit for club upgrades and safety enhancements.
That donation came about because of two other sizable donations – $25,000 from Strong Arm Baking Co. and $500,000 from Richard and Noel Moore. Richard Moore is a native of Oxford and served as state treasurer from 2001 to 2009.
The downtown Oxford bakery and kitchen was nominated for a Rush Limbaugh Great American Business by a loyal patron. Owners Julia and Thomas Blaine took the opportunity to pay forward the cash prize and challenge others in the community to contribute the other $75,000 to help BGCNCNC reach their Phase 1 goal of $100,000.
Robinson said she and the Blaines attended school together in Oxford. “It’s absolutely priceless,” she said, “for them to be so selfless to (want to) provide great opportunities for young people.”
The initial phase of renovation has a price tag of about $1 million; the Moores’ contribution, matched with an additional $500,000 from the community, will create a games room, multipurpose classroom space and technology upgrades, Robinson said, in addition to collaborative learning space and remote learning stations for the Granville Club.
It sounds like a lot of space is needed to complete the renovations, but space is something that the BGCNCNC has. In 2016, Santa Fe Natural Tobacco Co. donated a 27,000 square foot warehouse to the BGCNCNC. Since then, the cavernous buildings have been reworked to provide adequate space for the administrative offices, as well as an activities space and a space for a makeshift cafeteria and homework spot.
When a team from The Goodwill Foundation visited the Granville Club, toured the facilities and then heard about Strong Arm’s and the Moores’ investment, “they wanted to be a part,” Robinson said, adding that the Goodwill team “have been fierce supporters of our programs here in Granville and Vance counties.”
Robinson has been involved with Boys & Girls Clubs for 17 years, but she wasn’t ever a club member. There wasn’t a club in Granville County for her to join. But she volunteered while she was in college and now she has the chance to have a front-row seat to see the Granville unit grow.
“I was one of the young people that needed a Boys & Girls Club,” she said. “I make it my mission to make sure that children have the chance” to be a part of such a strong organization.
The club helps young people make positive decisions and have positive youth development experiences, she said.
The renovations at the Vance club will be to its upstairs space, and it will provide more technology and make it a place “where teenagers want to go and grow and thrive.”
Both Robinson and Chief Executive Officer Donyell “DJ” Jones joined BGCNCNC during the pandemic, so they haven’t had the opportunity to get out into the community as they would have liked to.
But Robinson said she and Jones used that time in a positive way. “It was a wonderful opportunity for us to create the narrative” that is proving so helpful to share with the community as pandemic restrictions relax.
“I think people in the community are really beginning to see what the clubs can offer,” she said. “It’s amazing to hear people talk about what the Boys & Girls Club means to them.”
Now that the children are back, Robinson said she and the club staffs are eager to continue to enhance programming and create positive experiences for a brighter future. Pre-pandemic numbers showed upwards of 3,000 club members across the five-county area, and Robinson said last year’s 719 is definitely an atypical figure. Right now, she said Granville has served 156 club members and Vance has 149 on the membership list. “We are ready to relieve some of our capacity restraints,” Robinson said, and grow in numbers again.
“We want to go from the best-kept secret in the community to really being a community catalyst for youth development,” Robinson said.
Want to help BGNCNC reach the Strong Arm challenge? Visit www.strongarmbaking.com and click the link to donate.
Donate to www.bgcncnc.com or stop by the administrative offices at 105 West St., Oxford. The mailing address is BGCNCNC, P.O. Box 176, Oxford, NC 27565.