New Beginnings Community Church will open a home for teenage mothers next December.
The Matthews church will break ground on the property, Oct. 30 and prepare for construction.
The residence, called Hope Home, will help each mom build necessary parenting and life skills.
Up to five teenage girls at a time, ages 13 to 19, are able to stay in the home for up to 18 months.
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Resources for the mothers will include a mental health assessment, an individual care plan and case management.
The home is a part of a larger subdivision that the church purchased several years ago.
QCity Metro spoke with New Beginnings’ First Lady Twana Henderson to learn more about the project and what the church hopes to accomplish.
How will you support the girls after they leave the home?
The goal is to help them live independently after they leave. There may be a case where if they are younger, they may have to stay longer. Those types of situations will be handled on a case by case basis. A lot of people don’t have critical survival skills so we want to help them be successful in that.
Can you elaborate on each point of the care plan?
The mental health assessment would assess their emotional and psychological health. The need of case assessment will determine what they need and how we can support them with things like food support. Case management will help them with managing being a new parent.
What happens if they need to be in the home past 18 months?
That would be at the discretion of the case manager. Once the evaluation happens, it will tell us whether this is someone who needs to be in the home longer and what may be affecting their progress.
What’s the hiring process for the case manager?
They have to have certain credentials. They would have to be evaluated by the counseling department at our community life center. We will also look at the amount of experience they have and if that person aligns with what we are trying to accomplish.
How will you find moms who need assistance?
We will be working with various social agencies and medical facilities. Also, outlets like yours. When people read about what we are doing, they’ll be able to refer individuals.
Do you plan to expand past housing five girls?
Right now, we don’t know. We want to see how things go and it’s up to how God wants to work that out.
How do you plan to choose who will get to live in the house, considering there may be a high demand for girls who need help?
They’ll have to meet certain criteria such as where they are in their pregnancy, what other social supports they may have in place and what other needs they have.
How will you handle a mom who’s accepted into the home but decides she wants to end the pregnancy?
Our goal is to support young women who are having their babies. If someone determines they will not have their baby, there will be no need to have them in the home. They would need to yield that space to someone who needs the space and doesn’t have any support.
New Beginnings Community Church plans to have Hope Home fully operational in December of next year.
Once the residence is underway, New Beginnings plans to begin another residential program for formerly incarcerated individuals. Details about the project are still in development.