Citycon accepts President Sauli Niinistö’s challenge

 Citycon accepts the challenge that Sauli Niinistö, the President of the Republic of Finland brought forth on 7 September to help make the everyday life of young people better. Citycon is a natural part of the youth’s lives through the over 20 shopping centres it owns in Finland in the heart of nine cities. Shopping centres are an everyday and safe meeting point for the youth. Citycon will in the future explore the possibilities to make use of these meeting points systematically in even better ways to the advantage of the youth.

 

 - At Citycon we see the presence of the young people in our centres as a possibility to bring the youth and the surrounding society closer together. Next year Citycon will celebrate its 25 year anniversary. From the very start our company has been a part of local communities. We consider the President’s initiative as a challenge for us to find even more possibilities to help the young in employment and in their lives through and with the help of our centres, Citycon’s CEO Marcel Kokkeel explains.

 

 Citycon has been working on projects with the youth for a while now. For example at shopping centre Trio at Lahti youngsters are involved in the centre’s daily life. – We thought about ways to co-operate for the benefit of kids together with the City of Lahti. On the basis of this the Youth Services of Lahti started a youth centre called Tripla in the shopping centre, where young people can spend time, says Trio’s Shopping Centre Manager Ulla-Maija Kemppi. Also at Tampere the youth are taken into account. Citycon has together with the City of Tampere put together a work group that works on supporting the young people that like to spend time at the shopping centre Koskikeskus and its surroundings.

 

 - We would like to systemize and develop these ways of working and for example think about ways to use the individual empty spaces we have for youth work in the future. We would like to challenge all of our tenants, cities and other stakeholders to think of practical solutions with us, each of us using our own, specific know-how, encourages Marko Juhokas, the Head of Citycon’s Finnish Operations.

 

 Additional information:

 CEO, Marcel Kokkeel, tel: +358 40 154 6760

 Head of Finnish Operations, Marko Juhokas, tel: 040 735 4997