Advertisement

SKIP ADVERTISEMENT

POSTINGS: Community Service Organization's New Headquarters on W. 171st St.; A Building Designed for Youth

See the article in its original context from
December 16, 2001, Section 11, Page 1Buy Reprints
TimesMachine is an exclusive benefit for home delivery and digital subscribers.

When youngsters from Fresh Youth Initiatives, a nonprofit group that promotes community service among young people in Washington Heights, gathered last year to brainstorm about the design for their new building, they were very clear:

''They wanted a building that did not feel like a school; rather something like a second home,'' said Richard Dattner, president of Richard Dattner & Partners, the architectural firm.

With construction of the slim, four-story building on 171st Street near Amsterdam Avenue to begin in the spring, the 500 members of F.Y.I. will, as customary, get what they want.

The organization, founded in 1993 by Andrew Rubinson, is required by its charter to have two of its six board members younger than 21, as well as nonvoting members as young as 14. ''So there are young people who vote on our salaries, budget and, when it came to this building,'' said Rodney Fuller, the group's co-director, ''the amount of money we could spend'' -- $275,000 to buy the property from the city and $2.5 million for construction. The funds were donated by individuals and foundations. The project manager is Levien & Company.

Among other public service projects, F.Y.I. has the ''only youth-operated food pantry in New York City,'' Mr. Fuller said, providing about 200,000 pounds of donated nonperishable foodstuffs a year to 5,000 families out of a space in Holy Trinity Church on Cummings Street in Inwood. The youngsters grow produce in a community garden at P.S. 128 on 169th Street. And, at the organization's current, rented quarters on 172nd Street -- a block from the new building -- the young people sew hundreds of sleeping bags a year for distribution to homeless people.

The new, 9,000-square-foot building with an aluminum and glass curtain (or window) wall in front and a rooftop garden, has features that the young design consultants requested.

As Mr. Dattner, the architect, put it: ''One feature is that at the rear of the building there's a skylit atrium with an open stair leading to a lower level. On this lower level are two major spaces. One is the food pantry and the place where sleeping bags are assembled. The other, under the atrium, is like a small indoor amphitheater with large, carpeted, terraced steps; a place where young people, who like being on the floor, can just 'hang and chill' -- that's the phrase the kids used.''

Besides administrative offices on the ground floor, the rest of the building includes arts and craft rooms, a computer and multimedia room, a library/study hall and flexible multipurpose rooms.

Rubin Perez, 17, a senior at Cardinal Hayes High School, was one of the brainstormers. ''I wanted it to be a place that's comfortable,'' he said, ''not have the stress of outside bothering you.''

''It's way bigger than what we have now,'' Mr. Perez said. ''Each group will have their own space to do what they need to do. Now there's space to do a lot more sleeping bags.'' DENNIS HEVESI

A version of this article appears in print on  , Section 11, Page 1 of the National edition with the headline: POSTINGS: Community Service Organization's New Headquarters on W. 171st St.; A Building Designed for Youth. Order Reprints | Today’s Paper | Subscribe

Advertisement

SKIP ADVERTISEMENT