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Youth Empowering Services seeks city support for creative-arts workforce programs; manager offers introductions to funders
Summary
Youth Empowering Services presented a funding and partnership request to the council for youth fashion, branding and summer workforce programming and asked the city to consider support; City Manager said staff can assist with introductions to potential funders and ARPA-funded host partners.
Denzel Small, director of Youth Empowering Services (YES), used the public-comment portion of the meeting to present a proposal asking the council to support new programs that train youth in creative industries and entrepreneurship.
Small described program elements including a youth fashion showcase and training in videography, photography, fashion design, graphic design and AI integration. He said the group seeks $8,000 for eight youth fashion designers and $500 per branding and marketing package for 12 youth; he also referenced a larger sum requested for summer programming and workforce initiatives in the materials distributed to council.
Small said YES is partnering with multiple local organizations, including Bear Tracks, United Way, Refuge Church, Loud Entertainment, the Buell & Fish Library and Business Veil, and described a June fashion show and plans to take student designers to a Bay City showcase.
City Manager Tim told the council that staff could assist by making introductions to ARPA-funded host organizations, the Community Development Block Grant program recipients and private funders such as the Community Foundation or United Way, and encouraged Small to contact the manager’s office for follow-up. Council members thanked Small and said they would work with staff to explore connection points; no city funding decision was taken at the meeting.
