Youth Center Leaders Say Funding Is Critically Needed To Build Community Rec Center In West Duluth

DULUTH, Minn. — Valley Youth Center leaders say that rec centers providing healthy outlets for kids and teens are in short supply in Duluth, as they hope their plans to build a space that would serve the whole community can come to life.

However, it will cost millions of dollars to get there.

Angelo Simone is in his 40th year with the Valley Youth Center, which is currently based inside Laura MacArthur Elementary in West Duluth.

“The kids that we have here in West Duluth, with 85% of our kids being low income, they don’t have anywhere to go, so this is a good opportunity for them to come here and hang out and do some of the things they’ve never got to do before,” Angelo said.

Through all the seasons, Valley Youth Center’s small facility inside the school serves up to 80 kids a day.

It does a lot without much. Look around and you’ll see some chairs and tables, a pool table, a playground, and no air conditioning, which can be a problem during the hot summer months.

“Our place is so small as you’ve seen, so it’s hard to get the older kids, younger kids together, and so what are the older kids going to do?” Angelo said. “They’re going to mill off somewhere else, find a way to get in trouble.”

Angelo says he’s watched some rec centers close over the years, leaving kids and teens behind.

“I think our whole city has forgotten where they came from and these kids, they’ve been without for so long, they don’t even know,” Angelo said. “Some of these kids don’t even know what hockey is…if you’ve got to pay to go play, well a lot of our kids aren’t doing that.”

Russ Salgy has been with the Valley Youth Center for 25 years.

He says while places like the Valley Youth Center do help kids with their homework and overall focus on school, it’s really about setting them on the right trajectory, as some deal with difficult issues in their home life.

“We are trying to defeat anger and despair,” Russ explained. “If from birth to the time you get to kindergarten, all you realize at home is being angry or depressed and no recreation to counterbalance that, that’s what we do at the Valley Youth Center…we’re that happiness beacon. And we just wish the volume of places they could go would be a wider breadth, hit more happy points of light than the dismal things and angry things they’re seeing without us.”

He says the opportunities to play team sports is vanishing, and the costs are a huge barrier for many.

“And what’s disheartening on our end of town is that the pay-to-play network has overtook our kids’ ability to play anything that’s out there for them,” Russ added.

Russ says youth centers are the kind of thing communities must invest in long-term to keep kids out of the fray.

“And what’s their alternative?” Russ said. “They’ll find that neuroscience brain center for happiness, drugs, sexual activity, weaponry, bullying, that all brings a euphoric message in their brains and if we don’t have a climbing, learning how to swim, canoe, kayaking…that’s the dynamic we have to change.”

Angelo and Russ say the solution is to build a new, large rec center and community space in West Duluth.

Duluth city council unanimously approved a resolution for the project last year.

However, with economic inflation, the estimated cost for the project has risen from $15 million to $18 million.

“Funding for our kids should be number one,” Angelo said. “Not dog parks, not bike trails, not Spirit Mountain. Kids should be first.”

City council president Janet Kennedy has spearheaded the effort, and says the vision could become a reality with federal and state funding, plus community fundraising.

The impact of a rec center on the community can be far-reaching.

Take Grace Curtis for example, who went to the Valley Youth Center all the time as a kid.

“I grew up coming here,” Grace said. “I’ve practically been here since you’re allowed to come here…they helped me a lot. Growing up all I really did was stay home. I didn’t do much. Then when I started coming to the youth center like it really branched my opportunities and actually got me involved, like I started volunteering, I started finding my love for everything. The reason I love coming here is because they feel like a family to me. It’s another home. I feel safe.”

Mentors she looked up to such as Angelo and Russ, now inspiring her to be that role model for kids today.

“It can prove to them like you can do something, you know you can make a difference,” Grace said. “There is things you can do. Just because your home life is different, you can come here and enjoy those things and you can be who you want to be.”

The Valley Youth Center has hired a private contractor who is working on a feasibility study to see if the new rec center and community space could be built in Memorial Park.

Janet Kennedy says the city may apply to bonding in 2026 to help fund the project if not enough money is collected otherwise.