{"id":40797,"date":"2026-10-05T15:29:33","date_gmt":"2026-10-05T19:29:33","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/wzbd.com\/?p=40797"},"modified":"2026-10-05T15:30:07","modified_gmt":"2026-10-05T19:30:07","slug":"19-chosen-for-mayors-youth-council","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/wzbd.com\/index.php\/2026\/10\/05\/19-chosen-for-mayors-youth-council\/","title":{"rendered":"19 chosen for Mayor&#8217;s Youth Council"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\"><strong>By BOB SHRALUKA<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\"><em>WZBD.com<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">A total of 19 Bellmont High School students, all sophomores and seniors, comprise this year&#8217;s Mayor&#8217;s Youth Council.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">It is the fifth youth council, dating back to a group that Mayor Dan Rickord launched for the 2022-23 school year.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">\u201cWe&#8217;re trying to listen to our young people. We want to keep them here,\u201d he said at the time. \u201cIf they don&#8217;t find it here, they will go someplace else.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Members of the youth council are required to attend two city council meetings and park board meetings during the school year, then share with other members what they learned and what was discussed.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">They also have opportunities to volunteer, be part of community events, and share concerns they see in the city, explained the city&#8217;s community coordinator, Jamie Gephart, who works with the students.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<figure class=\"wp-block-image aligncenter size-full\"><img data-recalc-dims=\"1\" loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" width=\"370\" height=\"190\" src=\"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/wzbd.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/10\/Youth-coluncil-26-27.jpg?resize=370%2C190&#038;ssl=1\" alt=\"\" class=\"wp-image-40798\" srcset=\"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/wzbd.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/10\/Youth-coluncil-26-27.jpg?w=370&amp;ssl=1 370w, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/wzbd.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/10\/Youth-coluncil-26-27.jpg?resize=300%2C154&amp;ssl=1 300w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 370px) 100vw, 370px\" \/><figcaption class=\"wp-element-caption\"><em>Most of the new youth council members with Mayor Dan Rickord (photo provided)<br><\/em><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">The youth council also works with the city&#8217;s beautification program and will be getting applications ready for the spring of 2027, Gephart noted.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">\u201cWe have two committees this year, Event Committee and Service Project, and they are excited to get started,\u201d Gephart added.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Members of this year&#8217;s group are: Alexander Hall Kouk, Alexis Converset, Ally Porter, Ashlyn Bauman, Audrey Grimm, Ava Johnson, Averie Coats, Benjamin Goble, Bridget Juengel;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Also, Evalina Hernandez, Hudson Krull, Isabelle Gerber, Journy Mann, Katelyn Borne, Marleigh Salisbury, Maya Schlemmer, Michael Scheumann, Olivia Bessesen, Sebastian Heimann, and Sydney Bessesen.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\"><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>By BOB SHRALUKA WZBD.com A total of 19 Bellmont High School students, all sophomores and seniors, comprise this<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":7,"featured_media":40798,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_feature_clip_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2},"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false},"categories":[9],"tags":[17,14,15],"class_list":["post-40797","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-community","tag-community","tag-decatur","tag-featured"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/wzbd.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/10\/Youth-coluncil-26-27.jpg?fit=370%2C190&ssl=1","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/wzbd.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/40797","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/wzbd.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/wzbd.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wzbd.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/7"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wzbd.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=40797"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/wzbd.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/40797\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":40801,"href":"https:\/\/wzbd.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/40797\/revisions\/40801"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wzbd.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/40798"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/wzbd.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=40797"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wzbd.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=40797"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wzbd.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=40797"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}