Every Wednesday and Thursday night I work at the Albert Park Youth Club. The youth club is run by my good friend Dave Fraser. Dave is a licensed vicar in the Scottish Reformed Church but has chosen to leave “formal” church work and to live a missional life-style in Broughton. Over the last two years of knowing Dave, I have seen him do incredible things.
Several years ago Dave became the manager of the football pitch and changing rooms in Albert Park. The football pitch was badly out of keep and the changing rooms had been abandoned and thus vandalized and burned-out. Over the past several years Dave and his staff have restored and transformed the changing rooms into a multipurpose youth club. Many activities like pool, ping pong, Sony Playstation, board games etc. have either been donated or attained at a reasonable price to help transform the changing rooms into a great place for youth to hang out.
Over the past two years Dave has applied for and receive multiple grants and public funding to have a brand new astro-turf field put in, two full-sized goals, and four smaller goals. Most recently received Dave applied for and received 100,000 pounds (over $200,000) in regeneration money to give further renovations to the youth club. The additional renovations include putting in a computer lab with ten laptops and a printer, a music studio (in progress) for the youth to record their own music, a Nintendo Wii, as well as a new snooker table, ping pong table, air hockey table, and foosball.
Dave truly has the heart of a servant and is a modern day Jesus with skin on as he tries to bring about both social and spiritual salvation in Broughton. Please pray for Dave and the work he is doing here.
Enjoy the photos!!
Chad
Me and Dave Fraser
The Albert Park Youth Club and changing rooms
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The football astro-pitch.
The front room (main entrance).
The young people designed and made the art work.
A fully functional kitchen.
The computer lab for the after school program and for the youth club to use.
Brand new ping pong table, snooker (like pool) table, air hockey, and table football (foosball).
Snooker table
Awesome stuff Chad. We will continue to pray for the work you and Dave are doing there. God bless.
I can’t believe all the work is complete. How amazing everything looks. Tell Dave what a pleasure it was meeting him and to see first hand the call that God has on his life to be salt and light in Salford.
I can’t believe how awesome the youth center looks! I am off to work, but I just wanted to let you know that I love and miss you! -Katie Sue : )
Wow, it looks so different from last year! That is really awesome.
Wow! It looks so good, so different! It is exciting to see how much it’s changed.
The youth of Salford are so blessed to have people like you and Dave. It is my prayer that many of them will find God and get to know how really blessed they are.I’ll keep praying.
That youth center looks great. It is definitely a great place for the youth to hang out – if that’s how they say it over the pond. The field looks better then ours in the picture. Tell Dave to keep up the great work.