Senator Jonathan Wehner Proposes Annual Grants for Youth Focused Organizations to Help Prevent Crime

Senator Jonathan Wehner proposed, during his contribution to the Firearms (amendment) Bill, that the government should guarantee modest annual subventions — as little as $2,500 — to organizations whose whole mission is keeping young people productively engaged.

The opposition senator, who supported the bill's stiffer penalties for gun crimes, told the Upper House that prevention must come before punishment and that prevention has a budget line already waiting to be used.

"I know in the budget there is a line item... entitled 'grants to individuals and organizations.' This is broad. There's no specificity as it relates to that," Senator Wehner said. "But I am asking, Madame President, as a young man, as a young senator in this honorable house, for youth organizations, or youth-centered organizations, whose whole mission is to engage young people on a productive basis, that the government looks at them and prioritizes giving those organizations a subvention. Even if it's just a $2,500 a year, a $5,000 a year."

The request, he stressed, is deliberately modest: "I don't think this is something that is controversial... or something that is too burdensome for the government. We're not asking for a million dollars — less than ten [thousand]."

Supporting Youth-Focused Organizations Making a Positive Difference

Senator Wehner gave examples of such organizations. The National Youth Parliament Association of Antigua and Barbuda has operated for years on goodwill alone.

"I couldn't get up here and say that and not mention the National Youth Parliament Association of Antigua and Barbuda, and the work that that organization has been doing with so many young people for so many years across this whole nation, without any consistent form of revenue," he said. "They have to go out and beg."

He also pointed to the example set days earlier at Government House, where the Hopeful Hearts Foundation launched the Good Deeds Day initiative in Antigua and Barbuda. "We see young people stepping out, making an effort, sacrificing their time and resources to do good. We have to support them, Madame President, as a nation, as a society. And that's all I'm asking for."

Prevention as Crime Policy

The logic connecting a $2,500 grant to the gun debate, Senator Wehner argued, is direct: "If young people are engaged in something that is proper and good and beneficial to them and society, when they out of school or they are not home, they don't have time to be committing criminal activity."

It was the first of several recommendations the senator put forward under his declared philosophy for the morning — "as the opposition we not only oppose where necessary, but we also propose what is necessary" — and it aligned him with calls made across the chamber, including Senator Ashworth Azille's insistence that prevention funding sit alongside the new penalties, and Opposition Leader Jamale Pringle's push in the Lower House for youth alternatives and rehabilitation.

Whether the government takes up the suggestion may become clear when the budget cycle opens, but Senator Wehner made plain he intends to watch the line item. "As we have the line item in the budget for grants to individuals and organizations, let's properly flesh that out and prioritize," he said. "I'm asking for it to be a priority for funding and resources to be put towards organizations that focus on engaging young people productively."