The Boys & Girls Club of Elgin has received $1 million in federal grant funding for improvements to its more than 30-year-old facility in Elgin.
Democratic Congressman Raja Krishnamoorthi of Schaumburg presented the check to agency officials Monday.
The building improvements will include such security measures as doors with buzzers and security cameras to maintain the safety of the agency aimed at supporting teens and at-risk youth in the community.
April Wells, the Elgin board president at Boys & Girls Clubs of North Central Illinois, said refreshing spaces for the teens to interact with mentors and peers is also in the plans.
“Thank you that our members, our learners, were on your mind,” Wells told Krishnamoorthi.
Elgin Mayor Dave Kaptain speaks of the necessity for building improvements for the Boys & Girls Club of Elgin to continue its mission of community-building following delivery of a $1 million federal grant by Democratic Congressman Raja Krishnamoorthi of Schaumburg on Monday.
Eric Peterson/epeterson@dailyherald.com
Elgin Mayor Dave Kaptain said the Boys & Girls Club has been an important element of the community for decades, and upgrades to the building it’s been using since the early 1990s are due. He described the club as a building block, allowing young people to move on to a better adulthood.
Krishnamoorthi said the whole idea of the club to help produce the future community and regional leaders. He emphasized such grants as the one the club received are the product of carefully considered bipartisan decisions.
“I jumped at the opportunity to provide funding,” he added. “It’s a modest investment by the federal government in your future and the future of the United States.”
Krishnamoorthi said that all people join clubs of one kind or another during their lives, and it’s the kinds of clubs they join that shape their futures.
“Someone once said to me that children are like Kodak film,” he added. “They just need exposure and development, and that’s what you do here.”
Wells said the average daily attendance of Boys & Girls Clubs throughout the entire North Central Illinois chapter is about 2,300 kids.
“We’re doing this against the background of serving all our members,” she said of the implementation of the grant.
As not every single dollar of the grant had as yet been earmarked for a specific aspect of the planned building improvements in Elgin, she said there’s a chance some funding could be spread out.
“Let’s be honest, $1 million helps a lot,” she added.
Krishnamoorthi said the use of the federal grants is closely monitored and that every expenditure will at least have to meet the original intent as it was described in writing.