In the first few days after "Da Joint" opened, all the diaries and signing in books had had their cover pages filled with graffiti. We supplied coloured pens and paper, and Charmagne Johns and a group of young people came up with the slogan :

Y-PACT

Young People are Community, too!

It is a very clever play on words: a community has a duty to look after it's young people, but those young people also have a responsibility to that community. It has slowly become the guiding ethic at Da Joint.

Because the community came together with the young people to plan and build Da Joint, young people are happy to be involved in community projects. These projects have included refurbishing the much vandalised and graffiti'ed Pavilion in the Recreation ground ready for the Summer Festival, litterpicking, building picnic areas in the Rec, organising an open-air concert, the skatepark, and painting the Village Hall.

The Parish Council supplied all the paint and equipment, and the food for the lunchtime barbecue. Cooking was done by two parents, Steve and Keri.The project took a whole weekend, and the Pavilion has remained graffiti free in the 18 months since. What was particularly rewarding was the genuine thanks from older members of the community, for whom the Pavilion has a special significance because the Pavilion is our War Memorial. The project also presented the idea to the community that most young people are good at heart, and were genuinely grateful for their Joint.

Young people always get blamed for all the litter, so it was heartwarming when the local press picked up on the story about young people helping to tidy up the mess. The Borough Council do a certain amount of cleaning, but now always as good as it could be: whilst conducting this litterpick we found two beercans dated 1998! Surely no-one could have missed those cans for FIVE years!!!