Sir Colville Young Building Inaugurated in Belize City

Following years of strategic planning and investment, the Belize Scouts Foundation today officially inaugurated the Sir Colville Young Building.  Located on Albert Street, just a stone’s throw away from Saint John’s Cathedral in Belize City, the building was handed over to the Belize Scouts Association for use as its headquarters. This morning, a plaque unveiling ceremony was held to recognize the donors that made the construction of the building possible. News Five’s Paul Lopez reports.

Paul Lopez, Reporting

The Belize Scout Foundation’s Sir Colville Young Building in Belize City has been completed. The headquarters was officially inaugurated this morning with a plaque unveiling ceremony.

Hilberto Riverol

Hilberto Riverol, Executive Director, The Belize Scouts Foundation

“I joined the association in 1984 and there were still discussions about constructing a building at that time. But, there wasn’t enough support, encouragement, stamina. There was not someone to say let’s take the bull by its horn and get it done. This happened in 2018. And, 2019, 2020, 2021, 2022, now we are in 2023, the building is now completed. It is being occupied by the scouts and it is one of the major achievements the foundation can be proud of. The chairman and the board of directors were set on seeing the achievement of this building and they carried out true with the support of Mr. Francis Woods anything is possible.”

The construction of the building was supervised by Francis Woods, the Chairman of the foundation’s Building Sub-Committee.

Francis Woods

Francis Woods, Chairman, Building Sub-Committee

“Years ago my dad and I, whenever we would see something about scouts we would talk about how important scouts is for the formation of a good country and that Belize needed a stronger movement in scouts and we always pondered on different ideas of how we could help. So, when Dr. Villanueva approached me and tells me to be a part of the building’s construction it was an absolute yes, without a doubt. That was what we were going to do. We started with a beautiful conceptual drawing and we had to do some gentle adjustments, to physically fit the size of the structure on the property. When we came out here and started to do the layout we found out that fences were in the property so we had to adjust the building to fit it.”

The completed structure boasts two executive offices, a large office for field officers, a conference room, a scouts shop, a four thousand square-foot terrace, an apartment and a Sir Colville Young Museum. The building was also designed to weather category three hurricane force winds.

Rene Villanueva

Rene Villanueva, Chairman, Belize Scout Foundation

“I told Hilberto we are going to start a building with six thousand dollars. Then Excellency, your government came in, The Republic of China (Taiwan) through His Excellency Sir. Colville came in with the first substantive amount of cash and when your government saw what was happening they were encouraged to disperse that cash to us. It was all driven by hope, hope that one day we would be doing exactly what we are doing today, inaugurating this building officially and handing it over to the scouts association for home it was built, for the purpose of scouting. So, you see faith, hope, love and things happen. The greatest of these is love. So, once we apply that formula to our lives, then miracles do happen.”

Reporting for News Five, I am Paul Lopez.