A community remand home that will give youth the opportunity reconnect with family has opened in Tauranga.

The home will start taking young men from next week and it can take three 13 to 17-year-olds at a time.

The Whare Tuhua remand home is different from others in the country because it is a partnership with Oranga Tamariki and the Te Tuinga Whanau support service trust, other homes are owned by the ministry.

Minister for Children Tracey Martin says the trust have entered into a partnership with them to support young people and their parents.

'This is about opening community remand homes so that we can try and change the direction of those young people.

'The whole goal is to try and keep young people out from behind the wire.”

She says a lot of those who end up in the youth justice systems have experienced trauma or a difficult upbringing.

'Most of these young people are just sad and most of it's just incredibly tragic that they found themselves on this pathway and given half a chance they'd get off but they don't have the tools.

'The sad thing and the positive thing is that often for these young people this is the best environment they've ever lived in. It's a sad thing but a good thing because they can see what's possible.

'Also while they're here there's education that is part of this but not your standard education, it's based around them.”

The goal of people's stay in Whare Tuhua is to reconnect them with their whanau and their own mana.

George Kahika is the caregiver at the home and he says the plan is to give them simple skills that will empower them.

We want them to know their pepeha and to be able to explain where they come from, George says.

'Being able to stand up and be proud of who they are and where they come from and then hopefully we'll peak that interest that they'll want to dig into it a little bit further.”

He says the day will start with a karakia and class will start at 9am where they will learn about their whakapapa and pepeha.

The Whare Tuhua classroom. Image: Daniel Hines/SunLive.

The day will also involve a visit to the local gym and the afternoon will involve learning from different kaiako who have been chosen for the different skills they have, including fishing, hunting and art.

He says the residents will also be involved in preparing meals and the day will end with a karakia.

'It's teaching them to be a little bit responsible for themselves - self dependant.

'If we can influence them to change how they think particularly around the having fun bit, you don't have to be naughty to have a lot of fun. If we can do that, we're winning.”

He says ultimately they want to help change their path and keep them out of prison.

Youth Justice regional manager Shaun Brown says people will stay for as little at 2 days or two to three weeks.

'We would hope that somebody has quite a short stay because that's what remand is. It is a taking away of a liberty because they're not free to leave and do as they please.

'It's about trying to get them back with their whanau or back in the community as quickly as we possibly can.

'That's why we want these homes in the community so that they're staying in the community rather than end up in a youth prison residence with 30 or 40 other kids that have got challenging stuff going on.

'To keep them close, surround them with good people, hopefully connect them straight back into the communities they come from.”

Te Tuinga Whanau Support Service Trust chief imagination officer Tommy Kapai Wilson says they also hope to get some of the young people a job when they leave the Whare Tuhua.

He says the home is the incubator for change and he wants the residents' friends to learn from their good experiences.

The trust has 30 properties around Tauranga that provides homes for at risk people so running Whare Tuhua is natural progression, Tommy says.

'We felt it was no different providing housing and the wraparound services to at-risk youth, it's the same set of circumstances and the same Solutions.”

Tommy says the neighbours of the home have been really supportive.

Tracey says, 'It's wonderful that the neighbours here have been so positive, it's going to make a huge difference.”

She says many of the young people that end up in remand homes have felt unwanted at some point and having an unsupportive community would compound that.

'Their circumstances are such that they have already been made to feel like nobody wants them in our society here. So the fact that, that's not going to be the circumstances here, these neighbours have said we're happy that you're here and they came to the opening, it's really great.”

Whare Tuhua is one of 16 community remand homes that are being developed around New Zealand over the next four years.