Hundreds have signed a petition calling for a former youth centre, just a street away from the spot where two teenagers were stabbed last weekend, to be brought back into use.
Local residents and community leaders have repeated their calls for Bristol City Council to back their campaign to take back the site of Eagle House Youth Club, which was shut down by Bristol City Council in 2014, and later leased to an evangelical church.
More than 300 people have so far signed a petition set up last July by Carol Casey, the chair of the local residents association. Carol also set up a multi-agency group to tackle anti-social behaviour and opportunities for young people in Knowle West last year.
If the campaign to reopen Eagle House's youth centre is successful it would not be the first time such a knife crime tragedy sparked a rebirth of the centre. Back in 2013, Eagle House's Youth Centre was closed down, but reopened following a community outcry at the fatal stabbing in Knowle West of teenager Jake Milton. The youth centre was opened for little over a year, before the council closed it again in 2014. Now, ten years on and after another two teenagers - Mason Rist and Max Dixon - were fatally stabbed, the long-running calls to reopen Eagle House have seen renewed urgency.
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Back in July, Carol said the plan was to re-imagine Eagle House as a ‘fully-purposed children and young people’s centre’ which would ‘change the narrative in Knowle West for generations to come’. Eagle House Youth Centre closed in a wave of cuts to youth services in 2014. There is a youth club run by Knowle West-based youth service charity Youth Moves that is based at The Park nearby, and Bristol City Council is putting millions into a controversial ‘Youth Zone’ for South Bristol, called 224, which is about to be built at Inns Court, with the location specifically chosen to try to bring together young people from Knowle West and Hartcliffe.
Eagle House was one of the original community buildings included in the expansion of Knowle West in the 1950s. It was visited by the Duke of Edinburgh in 1959. Eagle House’s Youth Centre was finally closed in 2014, despite welcoming up to 100 young people every week for youth club and other activities.
Two years later, it was leased out by the city council in 2016 under a Community Asset Transfer for ten years to the Nigerian-based evangelical church Mountain of Fire and Miracles Ministries, while the community social club building next door is still open and thriving for the community.
The city council does have longer-term plans for the entire Eagle House site in Newquay Road, which is a short walk around the corner from Ilminster Avenue. But local people say Eagle House should be repurposed as a youth and children’s centre once again, to provide a safe space for young people.
“The outcomes for the younger generation in the Filwood area of Knowle West are amongst the poorest in the country,” said Carol Casey, in July last year. “Since the closing of Eagle House in 2014, the life for children and young people in this part of Bristol has been stark.
“With a lack of consistent provision and the promise of a better life, many young people are drawn towards the exploitative life of selling drugs and petty crime. All professionals engaged in the area agree that early intervention is needed, but this needs to be met at its roots.
”With the re-imagining of Eagle House as a fully-purposed children and young people’s centre, we can change the narrative in Knowle West for generations to come. We can work with families from the start of their journey as parents, offering support, advice and a safe place to play for their kids during the day. For school age kids we will build a rich play environment for after school, weekends and holidays.
“We will grow food and prepare it in our community kitchen. We will see children from toddlers to teenagers, and see that they get the grounding in life many are being deprived of. We can change the prospects for local children in this area and give them a future of hope and opportunity,” she added.
The council’s lease of the building to the church runs out in 2026 and the council has previously stated it will not be renewed. A spokesperson for Bristol City Council said: “We remain in contact with the tenants to ensure the terms of the lease are adhered to. Our Community Development team have written to the tenants to offer support in opening the building for community use.”
