Autumn is upon us, and in keeping with the October theme of BMC News, the Boyle Street Community League’s new project is all about learning – learning about our community. By the time you read this, our Boyle Street Community Program and Membership Animateur will be starting to work, learning what Boyle Street needs to make the new community centre lively and active.

What’s an “animateur” (or “animator”), you might ask? The short answer is someone who “animates” the community. The long answer is someone who goes out into the community to encourage involvement, develop programs, and respond to community needs – in other words, someone who will make our community league, and our new facility, hum with energy and activity.

Community needs assessments have been done since 2006/2007 and almost every year since. But a paper list isn’t the same as going out and talking with people, one on one and in groups, about exactly what we want our new centre to do for us. So we’ve hired someone who will spend a year doing just that – listening, putting together the results, and turning it into concrete events.

We have two challenges. The first will be programming during the “opening summer,” when the community centre will be open, but the construction and landscaping will still be happening on the east side of the site. We want to make our summer a kind of “gumboots festival” of special events as well as regular programs. Our aim is to welcome people to the new centre and get their feet used to beating a path to our door! Ideas so far are as diverse as making the new multipurpose theatre into a BYOV (Bring Your Own Venue) for the Fringe Festival; entering a flock of promotional rickshaws in summer parades; or having karaoke nights, lion dances, round dances, and other festival events. We hope to tie into the summer festivals already happening all around us.

We want to make our summer a kind of “gumboots festival” of special events as well as regular programs.

Then, we have a Grand Opening to plan for September of 2012, followed by a year of regular programming. That’s going to be when our new community heart becomes a regular destination for a variety of groups, from sports to dance to theatre to music, as well as cultural events and community rentals.

To find out what exactly those programs will be, our animateur will have a busy schedule, meeting community members, holding “regional meetings” in all the areas of our neighbourhood, visiting groups and organizations throughout the community who contributed ideas to our needs assessment, and reaching past the boundaries of our community to assess the needs of our neighbouring communities and “communities of interest” all over the city.

If you have ideas you want to share, programs you want to run or see us run, or just want to be a part of the learning curve, call our community program and membership animateur at (780) 422-5857 or e-mail us at programs.boylestreet@gmail.com. We’ll be delighted to work with you to make the Boyle Street Community Centre come alive!