Between the 28th and 30th of April, YMCA Europe was present in Strasbourg for the Stakeholder Meeting for the Implementation of the Charter for the Participation of Young People in Local and Regional Life, held at the European Youth Centre of the Council of Europe.
Dragoș Tarța and Mark Healy attended on behalf of the organisation, joining a diverse group of stakeholders including representatives of the Council of Europe and its Youth Department, the Congress of Local and Regional Authorities, local authorities, and civil society organisations from across Europe. The meeting provided a crucial forum for translating the principles of the Charter into actionable, concrete commitments.
Participants engaged in collective exchanges of good practices, exploring innovative approaches for civil society to engage with local and regional authorities and to encourage the opening of decision-making spaces to young people. Dragoș and Mark brought YMCA Europe’s extensive experience in empowering young people to actively shape community life, presenting approaches to strengthening collaboration between youth organisations and decision-makers.
The meeting comes at a particularly significant moment, as young people across Europe increasingly report feeling disengaged from democratic processes. YMCA Europe’s presence in Strasbourg reflects the organisation’s long-standing commitment to ensuring that youth participation is not merely an aspiration on paper, but a tangible reality in local and regional governance.
With generations of experience in building inclusive spaces where young people can lead, advocate, and contribute, the YMCA continues to bring that legacy into the policy spaces where it matters most.
Delivering the closing speech of the Stakeholder Meeting, Dragoș Tarța stressed the importance of ensuring that participation is an accessible process to all youth, as well as the need for cooperation between Council of Europe institutions, public authorities and policymakers, civil society and young people, in order to ensure the Charter delivers tangible outcomes that transcend the field of policy into the grassroots level and the lived experience of young people.
