By Mara Pattison-Sowden
YOUNG kids from Woori Yallock are keen to get off the streets and have somewhere safe to skate.
Young people aged 12 to 25 were invited to a Community Youth Forum on Friday 5 November at the Woori Yallock Community House.
The forum was supported by Youth Foundations, then Gembrook MP Tammy Lobato and the Woori Yallock Community House.
Woori Yallock Community House co-ordinator Sonja Mazar said more than 30 young people responded to the questionnaire at the forum.
“Of course we need a skate park. The young kids have nothing to do after school here,” she said.
The young people responded to several questions, including what they do in Woori Yallock, what they enjoy about living in Woori and what they don’t like about living in Woori.
Thirteen youths who answered the questionnaire spend their time bike riding in Woori, and nine youths said they enjoyed spending time with their friends, but 25 said they didn’t like living in Woori Yallock because it was too far away from everything, there was nothing to do, and there was a lack of public transport to get elsewhere.
Jacob, 12, said he would use a skate park every day after school.
“Sometimes we use the carpark in the shopping centre,” he said, and admitted it wasn’t the safest place to be, “but where else do we go?” Twelve-year-old Bryce said he usually just hung around home or dug up the parks to make bike jumps.
Woori Yallock mother of three Melanie McLaren said nothing had changed since she was a child.
“I grew up in Woori and we had nothing to do back then, we just hung around the shops,” she said.
“I take Jake up to Yarra Junction but last time he was up there he fell off and it was so far to get him and take him back down to Maroondah Hospital.”
Mrs McLaren said the boys needed somewhere close to home where they could spend active time.
“I’ve seen them zig-zagging in and out of cars in the carpark – these boys need a skate park,” she said.
