Youth-led initiatives in the community of Altona now have a chance to secure funding for their projects, thanks to a partnership between the Altona Community Foundation and RBC.

The Foundation was selected as one of the communities across Canada to participate in the RBC Future Launch Community Challenge, which makes available up to $15,000 in selected communities.

The purpose of the challenge is to encourage youth, ages 15 to 29, to initiate change in the community by addressing urgent needs.

"It really comes down to what the community would define as an urgent need," said foundation President Chris Sumner. "Some of the needs that would fall inline with the granting criteria would be things like the environment, food security, wellness, inclusion, belonging, learning, health, reconciliation and restoration, and beyond that essentially any other priority that would be considered an urgent need for the Town of Altona or the Municipality of Rhineland."

The funding could be split between multiple projects, or one project could receive the entire sum.

"In this day and age where it's very easy for young people to sink in to the nether regions of the internet via social media and other websites, this is our opportunity as the Altona Community Foundation to pull them out of their devices and get them actively involved in the community in a project that can have a significant positive impact in some of the areas that we already talked about, or an area that maybe we haven't talked about yet," Sumner said.

Grant applications will be accepted until September 18. Visit the Altona Community Foundation website for more information on how to apply.