Bruce Christensen
Northern News Services

Yellowknife (Feb 13/02) - The Side Door youth centre is almost ready to get into full swing.

The facility replaces the old Side Door which had been run out of the basement of the Anglican Church for the past several years.

The new building is one giant leap in the growth of Side Door since I first went to the centre. The building has many new features such as a completely enclosed computer lab, compared to the two- computer set-up of the old Side Door. Also the building has features such as black lighting, many other rooms for people to chill in and a coffee bar.

One of the ideas of the Side Door youth centre is to make it like an adult club.

There is a suggestion that people who want to attend Side Door will have to have a membership card. The card will be used like an I.D. card is used in a bar or nightclub, if you don't have it you don't get in. But this is just an idea. It would also allow Side Door to keep statistics on how many youth have come into the centre.

The Side Door was given $50,000 worth of software and games from Microsoft. The games include titles such as Motocross Madness 2 and Flight Simulator 2002. The software titles include things like Windows XP.

The building does not yet have an exact date of when it will be opening, but the contractors are going to be gone in a few days and the building will open a few weeks later.