Santa Barbara’s Eastside Boys & Girls Club Reopening in July

Santa Barbara’s historic downtown Boys & Girls Club is rebuilding itself this summer, with a familiar face at the helm. Mark Alvarado, a former member of the club and president of the alumni association, will be the new executive director. 

Summer youth programming on the city’s Eastside was looking slim after the United Boys & Girls Club of Santa Barbara County announced in May that it would be vacating the downtown spot come June — especially in the wake of Girls Inc. leaving in 2022 and the Eastside Library closing for renovations until July 15. 

To recap, the downtown club rented out its Canon Perdido Street facility to the United Boys & Girls Clubs to provide programming over the last two years, but asked United to leave due to disagreements over operations. Now, the club is planning to restart as its own organization, with new staff.

“United gutted the place and left me with one basketball and two pool sticks,” Alvarado half-joked as he walked through the club’s lobby. “But I see this as a blank canvas.”

Alvarado grew up attending the downtown club in the ’70s. Originally established in 1938 as the “Boys’ Club of Santa Barbara,” the site was created to give young boys a place to go after school and in the summer. Since then, it has become known for its academic and athletic success stories, with alumni such as NBA Laker Jamaal Wilkes and NFL players Randall and Sam Cunningham. 

“From my perspective, we have such a huge facility, we have a wealth of programming that we can offer, we have some seed money that we’re working with — we feel like we can operate successfully without competition, because we are the foundation of youth services in the city of Santa Barbara,” Alvarado posited. “And a failed collaboration is not going to wipe away 84 years of history in this building. We just have to start from the ground up, with community support.”

Alvarado’s voice echoed as he walked through the gym, “This is where I learned to tie my shoes and chew gum at the same time,” he laughed.

As he took this reporter on a tour of rooms, he expanded on the club’s future plans — dance and performing arts in the dance studio, an athletics program in the gym and field, a music and recording program in the Notes for Notes studio, and a culinary program in the club’s commercial kitchen.

Additionally, the club plans to create pathways to programs at Santa Barbara High School, including using its computer lab to equip kids for the Multimedia Arts and Design Academy and revamping the arts room to serve as a bridge to the Visual Arts and Design Academy. 

The classroom — fitted with a chalkboard, bookshelves, and desks — will be a tutoring center where kids can work on reading, writing, and math. And the old game room, currently hosting some worn-looking foosball and pool tables, will be reimagined as an arcade. 

Alvarado and the club’s board of directors will act as lead facilitators with supervising staff, but specific activities will be run by various partner organizations who are “willing to come in and work with our kids” with “the autonomy to do their programming here,” Alvarado explained. 

He emphasized that club fees — formerly around $40 — will be “nominal,” at only $25 and with scholarships available.

However, this summer, they are starting small with a “drop-in program.” Beginning on July 8 and running until August, some of the club’s spaces will be open from 11 a.m. to 5 p.m. for kids who need a place to hang out, play games, shoot hoops, and generally pass the time until school resumes in the fall. 

“It’s going to take time for us to get to where we want to get; it’s going to be baby steps,” which will allow the club to work out some operating kinks and hire additional staff to prepare for the upcoming school year.

Alvarado stressed that he wants the community to know that the facility, “is open and will be operating for the kids in this neighborhood — the Eastside.” 

On Sunday, June 23, the club will be hosting a community meeting, open to the public with attending officials including the Eastside’s City Councilmember Alejandra Gutierrez, County Supervisor Laura Capps, and a representative from Salud Carbajal’s office. 

As for the club’s charter as a Boys & Girls Club under the Boys & Girls Club of America, boardmember David Bolton said that, from the downtown club’s perspective, “We never gave up the charter.” It was lost when United moved out, but the board is working with their lawyer to get it back, potentially with the help of United.

In a statement from the Boys & Girls Clubs of America (BGCA), the national organization said, “In June 2020, the Santa Barbara organization’s charter was dissolved upon the transfer of its Boys & Girls Club operations to United Boys & Girls Clubs of Santa Barbara (United) via an agreement executed by the board of directors of each entity … .“We fully recognize that this is a very challenging situation for all involved. However, only entities operating a Boys & Girls Club may hold a member charter with Boys & Girls Clubs of America. BGCA has continued to provide guidance to the former Santa Barbara organization, should they wish to pursue membership again with Boys & Girls Clubs of America and demonstrate an ability to meet all membership and chartering requirements.”

“We are still a Boys & Girls club; the name is still up,” Bolton said. “We are focusing now on rebuilding and programming to be bigger and better.”

Alvarado said the downtown club is going to be known as “The Club” and officially as the Boys & Girls Club of Santa Barbara, Incorporated. 

“We need to do a better job, not just this facility, but I think overall, the community needs to understand that if kids aren’t given extracurricular activities to participate in, then there are a lot of chances that they can get involved with things that aren’t so great for their future,” Alvarado explained. 

“We want to support character development, respect, responsibility, honesty — we want kids to understand those basic values that sometimes get lost in the mix, because it’s very easy for kids to go astray.”