“My Home Away From Home, My Sanctuary”

Kingsley’s The Rock Gives Teenagers a Safe Place to Hang Out

July 1, 2016

Isabel and Justin plan to attend Northwestern Michigan College this fall. Isabel hopes one day to open a therapeutic daycare to help troubled kids; Justin wants to be an engineer. Both teenagers believe they might be on a much different track had they not had the refuge of The Rock while growing up in Kingsley.

For six years, the nonprofit youth center has offered a place for sixth though 12th graders to hang out. Volunteers make sure the kids get some homework done; afterward, the teens shoot pool, play videos games or eat snacks and talk.

A DANGER ZONE

Diane Walton, founder and director of The Rock, in Kingsley for 40 years, and she’s sensed the need for a place for kids to hang out almost as long.

When she was a teenager in Fife Lake, there was a youth center that kept her out of trouble.

"I went through some rough times in my early teen life," Walton said. "When I was at the youth center, I wasn’t out doing the stuff which I shouldn’t be doing, which I did plenty of. I just never got caught."

That experience stuck with Walton. She moved to Kingsley after high school. She spent 18 years at Kingsley Area Schools, working in a library and lunchroom. She said she could relate with the kids who struggled to get through school unscathed, and she knew there were kids who were struggling.

Walton also noticed that kids on the periphery didn’t have anywhere to go between school and dinner time: It was a danger zone. "We had some shenanigans going on around here, you know, kids wandering the streets and everything. Once school gets out, if the parents aren’t there to pick them up, they were standing on the corner by the pizza place or wherever," she said. "Idle time. That’s all it takes. You can take the best kid, and they can make one poor choice, and then it takes a few years to straighten that choice out, if it’s a bad enough choice."

HOW THEY GOT HERE

Isabel grew up in Kingsley and started coming to The Rock in sixth grade, a month or so after it opened.

She’d been placed in foster care for six months after state officials found that her dad was verbally abusive. She and her siblings were returned to their mom after some trial visits.

"The first day I came here (to The Rock) was when they were giving my mom visitation rights to have us over for a weekend, and I was like, "˜I have nothing to do.’ My mom wanted to spend time with the younger siblings, so she’s like, "˜Oh, why don’t you have your older sister take you over there?’" Isabel recalled. "I’m like, "˜Oh yeah. What is this place going to be?’" The place would turn out to be a lot of things – a haven for homework, a source of clothes to wear to school, a place to learn job skills, a wellspring of confidence and identity.

"Mostly all my homework I got done here," she said. "I just can’t focus at home, and here I can. I can focus and get it done."

Justin moved with his mom and her boyfriend to Kingsley from Grand Rapids three years ago.

The Rock seemed like a good place to meet people.

"I was new to the area, and it was probably my first week of school, and I didn’t have a lot of people I really talked to, so I came here after school because I didn’t have anywhere else to go except home," Justin said.

Justin said he appreciated how the center helped him avoid temptation; his high school years were marked with incredible freedom he could have exploited. Every day after school it was up to him to walk the three miles to his home. In order to put off the walk for a few hours, he hung out at The Rock.

"That was one of the things I love about this place – it helped me keep out of trouble," he said. "All I knew when I first came here to Kingsley, there was a bunch of people doing bad stuff, but I came here, and I met a lot of good friends."

A LOOK TO THE FUTURE

Isabel moved with her mom to Traverse City two years ago, so she stopped going to The Rock in 10th grade. She graduated high school this year.

"When I moved to Traverse, I had to leave Kingsley kicking and screaming because this is my home. This is my home away from home, my sanctuary to get away from my siblings," she said.

There was nothing like The Rock when she moved to Traverse City. She joined a church youth group, but she said it’s not the same, and she appreciated how The Rock is religion-neutral.

The Rock helped Isabel learn job skills – she volunteered at the snack bar and now she works at a cafe – and the experience shaped what she wants to do with her life.

"Coming here actually helped me realize there’s just a lot of hurt kids out there, and it made me want to go and help a younger group," she said.

Isabel and Justin have both noticed that Kingsley is nicer now than when they were younger – there’s a new library and parks, there’s a greater sense of town pride. They believe part of the change has to do with The Rock.

"I remember when I first moved here, there was a lot of drug activity," Justin said. "I feel like over the years it’s really distilled down, and I think this might have helped with that."

Isabel agreed. "With the youth center, kids have somewhere to go and not get influenced by those who are like, "˜Oh, you have nothing to do? Let’s go do drugs or something,’" she said.

Walton said that an elevated spirit has come along with the improvements in the village.

"People have been inspired to say, "˜You know, we’re not just this little rundown village. We’re better than that.’ People who I never would have thought would work together are working together now," Walton said.

A TOUGH PROPOSITION

The idea of a youth center is one thing. Starting one and keeping it going is another.

The Fife Lake youth center, for example, is long gone.

"There was a husband-and-wife team that saw a need and decided to do the best that they could. I think it had two booths and a pool table and a juke box and a little thing where you could go up and buy some pop and a candy bar," Walton said.

The Rock board member Sharon Neumann said youth centers are uncommon because they require someone to devote their life to them. It’s been years since there was a free youth center in Traverse City, though Neumann said there is a group attempting to establish one.

"You need a leader with vision and energy to help organize it and keep the process going, and you need a team of community members who are willing to support this visionary," Neumann said. "It wasn’t about any one person, although Diane was the driving force. This was about how we can make our community better."

Walton said she is frequently contacted by people who want to start youth centers. She’s been visited by people from East Jordan, Bellaire and Kalkaska.

"They all realize that there’s a need – it’s just, who wants to take that project on?" she said.

Walton started to research her project in 2005, Googling other youth centers, learning where they came from and how they sustained themselves. In three years she had a board and had raised $10,000.

FROM INTANGIBLE TO SOLID

The group set out to find a building, and a recently shuttered firehall beckoned. It was located where students would not have to cross a major road to reach it from school. It was the right size, and it was available – but for a price.

Because it had served as a government office, a purchase agreement needed approval from the Village of Kingsley as well as Paradise and Mayfield townships.

"One of the townships said – I’m not going to slice and dice here – one of them said, "˜If that’s what they’re going to put in there, I think we should give it to her,’" she said.

The building wasn’t donated, but the price was cut in half to $150,000. The newly formed nonprofit paid a $10,000 downpayment and were given a year to raise the rest.

The front of the building, covered in windows today, used to feature huge garage doors for the fire trucks to enter and exit. When the Rock first took over the building, Walton swept the floor, opened the doors, and invited people inside.

"I was pulling people off the street, trying to get people to come in here and interested in hearing our story," Walton said.

Walton said they were still $20,000 short two weeks before the deadline, but they managed to make up the shortfall. They’ve since made $300,000 in donated improvements to the building, which now offers a computer lab, game room, commercial kitchen, a clothes donation room and a wide-open lounge with pool tables, air hockey, and a fireplace surrounded by couches.

SAVIOR FOR A SENIOR

Another twist in the story of The Rock came when Grand Traverse County voters passed a Commission on Aging millage in 2010 that expanded senior services to rural areas. When officials looked around for places from which to offer services, The Rock appeared to be a natural fit; it had lots of nice space and was not used during schooldays.

It turned out that the two uses made surprisingly comfortable partners.

Mary Trumble, one of the Grand Traverse County Senior Center Network volunteers, has been coming to senior center activities at The Rock since she moved to Kingsley from Saginaw three years ago.

"There was nothing like this down home, and I had relatives, but everybody’s just busy, so I was really just drifting," Trumble said. "I’d just seen seniors coming in here, so I stopped and walked in and they said, "˜Welcome.’ It made me feel like home the minute I walked in."

Most of the volunteers for the teen program come from the senior program. Walton said that’s a dual plus: the teens get the benefit of mature mentors, and working with teens brings a new energy to the seniors’ lives.

Trumble said volunteering with the teens is a surprising source of joy.

"They’re really nice kids, very polite," she said. "I haven’t got to play pool with any of them yet, but I talk to them and tease them, and we all laugh and visit. They’re really nice kids, you know. You don’t find any of them that’s disrespectful. They are very nice. I enjoy it."

THEY HELP EACH OTHER

Walton has watched the interaction between the kids and the volunteers change the lives of some of the kids. Isabel has blossomed, she said, and Justin has become focused on growing up.

"Justin, when he first started coming here, I thought, "˜Oh brother,’ because he just needed some attention and stuff," Walton said. "He wouldn’t do bad things here, he’d just act silly. He used to have longer hair, so he’d take the comb and he’d tease it, and he’d walk in and he’d have a ’fro about this big. And just that kind of stuff."

Over several years Walton acclimated to the place and started to fit in. One of the seniors this year, Justin donated $35 so that he could attend the "project graduation" party, an all-night, no-drinking party for graduates to keep them out of trouble on an evening where there is a lot of trouble to find. Now he’s intent on going to college and having a career.

"I’d come here with friends, and it would be a good area to get work done, school work done, and then we could have some fun. We could be together and just like hang out," Justin said. "It was just a good place to be really."