Second Chance Village is continuing to expand its presence inside a shared creative building in Akron.
Our peer support space is gradually becoming more art-centered, with room for working studio activity, gallery space, Mental Martial Arts, peer support and other member-led creative work. We are also developing an additional upstairs room as The Neon Skeleton Candystore, giving the clubhouse another place for people to gather and helping us build a more sustainable membership environment.
One of the things that makes this location valuable is that we are surrounded by other independent creative activity. Music, recording, performance, visual art and community projects already overlap here, which creates opportunities for our members to participate in something larger than a traditional service program.
We are intentionally building this slowly.
Room by room. Program by program. Relationship by relationship.
Our goal is not simply to operate another program where people come in, receive a service and leave. We want to build an environment where people can belong, create, contribute, develop skills and become part of a functioning creative community.
For us, the next stage is about stability: keeping a dependable home for our peer support club, continuing to develop the Neon Skeleton identity, strengthening the arts side of our work and finding funding partners who understand the value of long-term community space.
There is much more developing behind the scenes than we are ready to announce publicly yet.
For now, we are building.
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