AURORA — Good things are in the works this year for kids who use and Moorhead Recreation Center.
Hoffman is reorganizing its space to better reflect what users want; Moorhead is in the midst of a that will take it from 5,000 square feet to 30,000 square feet.
Programs are expanding at both locations, and a citizen-led nonprofit is increasing its scholarship program to get kids into all the new activities.
The reason behind all of this is that the city has seen greater demand from the kids themselves.
“I think the attendance and participation has gone up in the last couple of years because there’s an increased assurance of safety, of nutrition, homework help and counseling help,” said Brenda Sturdivant, a city staff member for the Aurora youth centers. “It’s a great outlet in the neighborhood. Some of these kids don’t want to leave at the end of the day.”
City staff within the Aurora Parks, Recreation and Open Space Department said they are starting a baking club this year at Moorhead and Hoffman for kids and teenagers, to be held on Saturdays in the afternoon for two hours.
A soccer program for elementary school kids is also in the works, and is slated for a rollout this spring.
— formerly the Hoffman Heights Library, which closed in 2009 — will be reorganized into three distinct studio spaces in the next two months.
One will be a recording studio with a poetry performance stage, another space will be a game room, and a different space will be the new “exer-fit” room with interactive computer games that encourage a lot of sweat-breaking movement.
“We’re always evolving these (centers), and always pushing toward being physical and fit,” said Ruben Medina, operations and programs supervisor at Moorhead and Hoffman Heights. “We make an effort to actually know these kids here in the community, and to know what kinds of things they want and need.”
A citizen-led nonprofit called (ROAR) is also targeting the two rec centers this year.
“We selected the programs at the Moorhead Recreation Center because they are growing so rapidly, more than tripling from 12,000 visits in 2007 to 40,000 visits in 2012, which is evidence of the quality of the programs and the need,” said Arnie Schultz, president of ROAR and chairman of the city’s parks and recreation advisory board. “The Hoffman Youth Center was selected because it is the home of the only city-run teen center in the city, has only been open for a relatively short period of time and is also growing in attendance.”
Schultz started the group in 2007 to help area kids who get free or reduced-price lunches and who have good grades get into Aurora’s aquatics programs.
Since then, the nonprofit has funded swim lessons for 84 kids, dive and swim team memberships for nine kids, and lifeguard training for eight kids, seven of which the city hired as lifeguards.
To kick off its expanded scholarship program for 2015, the nonprofit is having a fundraiser from 11 a.m. to 10 p.m. Feb. 17 at Patxi’s Pizza, 185 Steele St. in Cherry Creek.
On a recent day off from school for kids in the Aurora Public School District, dozens of students who live and go to school in Original Aurora could be found at either Moorhead Recreation Center or Hoffman Heights.
“The growth is due mainly to (Medina’s) skills in communicating with the residents in the neighborhoods surrounding these centers,” Schultz said.
Medina holds community meetings to gauge what the people want through an informal process; there’s no agenda, but he said between 60 and 80 always show up and put their two cents in.
“This is a community space. If you want the community to buy into it, you have to include them,” said Medina, who is also a long-serving community engagement consultant for the Denver Foundation. “That’s how Hoffman was reopened. There was a need, and we listened.”
North aurora recreation meeting
When: 5:30 p.m. Feb 23
Where:Fletcher Community School gym, 10455 E. 25th Ave.
