Look down the railroad tracks at 29th St. and 5th Av. S. and you see bridge after bridge in either direction. Along the tracks lies a weed-filled, neglected, dumped-upon strip of land - in the very heart of Minneapolis. Someday, if a community vision becomes reality, this will be a recreational greenway. This summer, a nonprofit inner-city agency boldly expanded the vision: Include athletic fields for neighborhood youths.
Athletic programs, properly structured and supported, can make a difference in young lives. Such a difference is particularly important in the south central neighborhood that the Urban Ventures Leadership Foundation seeks to rejuvenate. Most residents are poor; many families are without fathers present and are headed by mothers under stress. Children and youths don't get enough parental involvement. Too often there is totally unstructured and unsupervised activity. The result, says Urban Ventures, is that 'free time often becomes a breeding ground for experimentation in drugs, sexual activity, criminal activity.'
The foundation, which works on economic development, job creation and family revitalization, also has an Urban Stars Athletic Club serving over 300 youths each year with teams, retreats, camping and mentoring. Urban Ventures wants to build athletic facilities to strengthen and expand the work of its amateur sports club. The first project would be HomeField, comprising two artificial-turf, fence-enclosed athletic fields between 5th Av. and Clinton Av. Last week the foundation publicly began an $850,000 fund drive to acquire the site just south of the Honeywell complex and build two first-class soccer and football fields. The project is headed by Will Gove, a civic-minded former Honeywell executive, now retired.
The playing fields would be the first phase of something bigger along the railroad tracks. Urban Ventures also envisions a facility called HomeCourt - an inflated dome for indoor sports - and an adjacent building for youth leadership training and other activities. Caring coaches would provide parent-like attention. Youthful peer relationships would help fill the void left behind by busing to distant schools. Such a vision is similar to that of new Police Chief Robert Olson, who talks about creating a police athletic league.
To Urban Ventures, efforts to revitalize the inner city - whether through jobs or other individual betterment - won't be sustainable 'unless we simultaneously work to raise up a new generation of leaders from today's young people.' The tools, in the foundation's words, are athletics that produce 'leaders who are excellent educationally, technically and morally.' The idea is like a flower poking up from among the weeds beside the tracks. It deserves to be nurtured.
