The Boys & Girls Clubs of Manteca/Lathrop are staging a free Day for Kids on Saturday, Sept. 15, from 11 a.m. to 3 p.m. at the Manteca clubhouse at 545 W. Alameda St.

The free event includes live wrestling shows starting at noon in the gym. They will start every half hour.

There will be food, a car show, bicycle raffle, pedal cars, laser tag, games, music and face painting. The face painting takes place from noon to 3 p.m. in the parks.

All activities and food are free.

Information about the club will be available Saturday. Club membership is open to youth 6 to 17 years of age. The price of $60 a year comes down to $1.15 a week.  Youth from low-income families can qualify for free scholarships. School year hours at the Manteca location are 3:30 to 7 p.m. Monday through Friday and at the Lathrop School site the hours are 3 to 6:30 p.m. Monday through Friday.

The fee covers all offerings including karate lessons from longtime instructor Robin Taberna twice a week.

The club offers homework assistance, computers for doing school work, and various character building programs. It also offers a variety of recreation games, dance classes, sports leagues, arts classes, or simply a safe place to spend time with friends.

Among the popular programs are the teen room, flag football in the fall, basketball in the winter, year-round karate lessons offered by Robin Taberna, and free music lessons.

For more information, call the club at 239-KIDS.

Lowe’s partners with

Boys & Girls nationally

Lowe’s has a national partnership with the Boys & Girls Club.

Staff from the 20 stores in the local Lowe’s district that covers Lodi to Salinas and the Bay Area  gathered recently for a team building event that included putting together over 300 bicycles, The two Stockton stores selected the Manteca-Lathrop clubs to present 20 of those bicycles to as part of the home improvement store’s national effort.

“The donation included bicycle helmets and bicycle locks as safety is important,” noted Tina Stewart who serves as human resources manager for the North Stockton store on hammer lane.

Boys & Girls Club Program Director Mark McCool said the bicycles will be used for as free raffle items for two events — this Saturday’s Day for Kids open to all youth of the community and the club’s Christmas Party that is open to club members.

To contact Dennis Wyatt, email dwyatt@mantecabulletin.com