Community center replaces old youth club in Brownsville

Children in the Buena Vida neighborhood near downtown lost their Boys and Girls Club three years ago. It has been missed.

Finally, they are about to get a replacement – a place to hang out, play basketball, do schoolwork.

The city is renovating the building of the former youth club on 8th and Tyler and has received a grant to put a playground in the backyard. The opening of the new facility is expected within the next month or two.

Roberto Castillo, 33, said he welcomes the play space for his children.

Across the street from the neighborhood sits Southern Pacific Linear Park, a strip of green stretching in front of the federal courthouse. But the park is far from an alternative to the youth club, residents say — it is too small, has no jungle gym and is skirted by busy streets.

“The park is nice, but it is dangerous for children to cross the street (to get to it),” said Castillo, who lives in the area with his wife and three children. He recalls when the Boys and Girls Club was open just down the street.

“My children used to get help with their homework there and play basketball,” he said. “I wish (the city) would open something like that again.”

The Brownsville Parks and Recreation Department is working to do just that. The department is transforming the former club complex into a community center, complete with a gated playground, activity rooms and a 10,000-square-foot gymnasium and boxing room.

Even the old, cement basketball courts will see an upgrade, Recreational Services Director Chris Patterson said. The court will soon have a surface that can double as a playing field for arena soccer, a popular street sport in the neighborhood.

Gone are the pool and the barbed-wire fence that once surrounded the club.

“The Cameron County jail is right down the street, and people used to confuse the building with the jail,” Patterson said. “They thought it was a juvenile detention center because of the fence.”

Since three Boys and Girls Clubs closed down in Brownsville – the club in the Buena Vida neighborhood was one of them – city leaders have worked to remodel each of them as a community center with after-school programs and activities to keep children off the streets and out of trouble.

The idea – remodeling existing facilities rather than building new ones – has worked well for the city’s recreation department, Patterson said.

Two facilities have opened so far, one at Gonzalez Park in Southmost and another at Oliveira Park in West Brownsville near Pace High School.

The center in Buena Vida is the last project and, in addition to the community center, will house the main offices of the Brownsville Parks and Recreation Department.

The cost to the city of remodeling the Buena Vida facility stands at about $275,000, officials said.

It should open by November, although the complete renovation will not be finished until the end of the year, parks and recreation officials said.

Just last week, the facility received its new playground equipment purchased with a grant of $192,000 from the Department of State Health Services and the Nutrition, Physical Activity and Obesity Prevention Program.

The playground will feature boulder-like structures with ropes children can climb and hang from, which requires more exercise than traditional equipment like swings and slides.

Residents said they are excited to see the center open its doors. It will serve as a safe haven in one of the poorest neighborhoods in the city.

“We need a place like that here,” said Maria Zaragoza, 68, who is the grandmother of Castillo’s children and lives next door. “We need a place where our kids can go to play and do their homework.”