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Last week's Youth Speak 2011 event brought together more than 250 local young people to discuss the problems facing Yorkton as the city's youth see them.

The summit was the first event of the city's YUMMY (Yorkton Understanding Minds of Many Youth) group, an organization formed at the suggestion of Mayor James Wilson late last year.

"We've been meeting and trying to ultimately bridge the gap between youth and adults, to give youth a voice in the community, and to be a positive change in the community," explained Jacquelyn Rogne, a 17-year-old member of the group.

The committee of roughly 10 students and its adult advisors from local community and government organizations have been meeting for about five months.

"Today is about collecting everybody's ideas-all the youth in the community," said Rogne on Wednesday. "Because we didn't want it to be only our ideas-we wanted to host an event that would shed some light on all of the other concerns of the other youth in the community, and to make them aware that we want to be proactive and encourage them to start to make that change."

Wednesday's focus was a list of issues important to youth compiled in the weeks leading up to the summit through advance polling. On Wednesday morning, the crowd of Grade 8-12 students in attendance participated in a system of instant voting using text messaging to choose their top three issues from a list that included such concerns as a lack of involvement in the community, a lack of employment opportunities, and problems with crime or bullying.

The issues that received the most votes were poor road and sidewalk conditions, a lack of respect for youth by adults, and-winning by a wide margin-a lack of things to do in Yorkton.

These three problems became the topics of conversation for the day's afternoon breakout sessions. Small groups of attendees sat around tables with adult facilitators to discuss the causes, consequences, and possible solutions to each issue.

Day two of the summit on Thursday was a smaller-scale event between the YUMMY members and representatives of their partner organizations, including city council, the Sunrise Health Region, Yorkton RCMP, KidsFirst, Big Brothers and Big Sisters, and the Yorkton Alliance of Asset Champions. The results of Wednesday's discussions were the focus of the Thursday talks.

YUMMY plans to build on these dialogues and become actively involved in the decisions that affect young people in Yorkton.

"I feel," said Tyler Pindus, 17, another YUMMY member, "that the youth summit was the beginning stepping stone for the communication between youth and the adults in Yorkton."