Youth centre may face homelessness after proposed budget cuts

A popular West Auckland youth hub may be left "homeless" if Auckland Council’s proposed budget cuts to funding youth services are approved.

Zeal West, a youth centre in West Auckland’s Henderson, may be left without a facility to operate out of if its loses funding in Auckland Council’s upcoming cost reduction plans.

General manager Hadleigh Pouesi says the centre may find it difficult to operate without budget support from Auckland Council.

“We operate out of a council-owned building, and some of our operation budget lies within council.

“If this budget moves forward, it means that a big portion of our operation budget will be cut, and it has the potential to leave us homeless, with no premises to occupy,” says Pouesi.

If Zeal West were to shut down, Pouesi says this may affect the level of youth crime rates in Auckland City.

“It’s pretty evident - you’re cutting the biggest youth centre in Auckland City,” he says.

“Our youth crime rates are already up, and we’re the only thing that's really operating out of prevention instead of recovery, so the writing is on the wall if places like Zeal West get closed down,” says Pouesi.

The centre currently runs a drop-in zone and different leisure sessions that can host up to thousands of young children each week.

“We’re dealing with hundreds if not thousands of people [using our facilities] a week,” Pouesi says.

“We operate a drop-in centre every afternoon. We’re pretty much running a twenty-four-hour operation here - whether it be providing space for young people to find a place of belonging or to be creative, or us responding to crises,” he says.

Zeal West was able to respond to the recent floods that affected many west Auckland locals earlier this year.

“We’ve been able to respond to things like the floods, cyclone, COVID-19 . . .” says Pouesi.

“West Auckland got wiped out with the floods, and so we’ve been cleaning up houses and accessing funds for people to get renovations done,” he said.

Pouesi says that Zeal West’s operations are crucial to helping the local youth.

“We’ll do everything that we can to keep us operating because the need is massive in our community,” he said.

Funding cuts to youth services is one of many actions that Auckland Council has proposed in the Annual Budget for 2023/24 to overcome a shortfall of $295 million.

Public consultation for the Annual Budget took place from February 28 to March 28.