Lots of Kids Friday night at the movie night

Lisa and Jim report a very successful Friday night movie night in their efforts to provide a positive youth activity as part of their Runaway and Homeless Youth Basic Center program. Around 38 people were here! They are doing a great job building these sorts of positive youth engagement activities. They watched the movie Twilight.

Parkersburg's Advisory Council met yesterday

We had a productive meeting of the Parkersburg Advisory Council yesterday. Besides recapping the successful 30th anniversary event at the end of February, and hearing about some of the site's and agency wide strategic planning efforts, we spent the most time planning a major event for November 6, at the Parkersburg Art Center. This will be a "kick off" (early!) of the Little Red Stocking campaign, by being a holiday stocking display and auction. Stay tuned for more details; various committees will start now doing the planning. We were also very pleased to have one of our foster parents join the advisory council, Missy Rickart. She participated actively, along with one of her foster children! She seemed excited to become involved, and it fulfills one of our goals, of getting our vibrant foster care program involved in the wider site development and marketing efforts.

Veteran's Support Group has a good turnout

17 folks came to the second Veteran's Support Group (dealing with traumatic brain injury and post traumatic stress disorder). This is not something we put on, but simply host and provide the community space for. They meet in our "5th door down"- which we set up as a community room when we received generous community support from foundations for the expansion of our office complex. The folks organizing the Veteran's group comment on how relaxed and welcoming the place is! This is important work in the community, and we are glad to be a part of making it happen! The next meeting will be May 26th at 6 pm.

CHS board strategic planning retreat

Shelley and I attended the CHS board's strategic planning retreat yesterday in Charleston. This was a most inspiring and uplifting opportunity. To see such a dedicated board, and who are both so interested in learning about the complexities of our work and challenges, and who show such a commitment to the agency. Charlotte McCullough was very helpful with a national perspective on some trends, and the board, and staff, worked in some small groups on upcoming possible areas of focus for our work ahead. There is a lot of energy for mentoring program at all the sites, and continuing our efforts around permanency, such as adoption and kinship care. I was encouraged by the interest in transition to adulthood issues by the workgroup and the wider board. This was an amibitious task on a Saturday (which was a beautiful tempting sight outside the windows!) for a group of around 25 dedicated folks connected to CHS. We were also affirmed that our local efforts are fitting in nicely with this wider agency strategic plan, and bolstered in our on-going efforts.

Teen movie night tonight at the "Drop In Center"

Jim and Lisa are having a teen movie night tonight as part of their positive youth engagement in the runaway and homeless youth program (Basic Center). They are showing Twilight. These nights provide an opportunity for neighborhood youth (and youth from the wider community) to come together for positive fun, and provide a chance to build a youth togetherness that might lead to support for at risk youth. We'll see how it goes!

Children's Memorial Flag Day-Wood County WV

A number of our staff participated in the Wood County version of the Children's Memorial Flag Day today down at the court house flag pole. I welcomed everyone and gave some opening remarks about Child Abuse Prevention, and our belief about "everyone can make a difference" and that strengthening families and reduce the risk factors was a way a community could impact the issues. I also gave acknowledgement of all the efforts all over the state, in every county, and all across the country to participate in this occasion. There were about 60 people present on this blustery, windy, sunny day. The DHHR staff was well represented, as well as law enforcement, the prosecutors office, other private agencies. We had proclamations from the governor, the county commission, and the mayor of Parkersburg to share. A special recognition was given to Jodi Boylen, an assistant prosecutor for her work over the years with CPS cases.

100th post! Site Strategic Plan meeting

A goodly number of local site staff gathered yesterday over brown bag lunch to review the work on the local site strategic plan. There was good participation and involvement in looking at the plan, and implementation status for a wildly active children and family service agency! At the end, I challenged or encouraged any staff who wanted to gain some grant writing experience, to see me about some of the many possibilities we have coming up. We have a skilled and experienced bank of grant writers on board, so assistance would be close at hand, but its a good professional growth experience, and our site's success is to a large degree built on some energetic grant writing over the past 10 years. Stay tuned for more updates on all the exciting things going on as outgrowth's of the site's strategic plan! (I hope to post the plan itself soon)- waiting for a few updates to be entered into it.