In its 12 years of operation, the Flathead Youth Home has never really felt at home. It has been forced to move twice and this type of instability is precisely what youth home officials want to avoid. But as of May 9, those concerns are now relegated to the past. The kids have a permanent home. And it’s a nice one.
Last week, workers for Swank Enterprises put the finishing touches on Flathead Youth Home’s 5,600-square-foot, 10-bedroom house on the corner of Eighth Avenue East North and Oregon Street. The shelter’s director, Lance Isaak, and other officials oversaw planning and design to ensure the house specifically meets the needs of the kids. Also, it’s in town, which cuts down greatly on travel expenses compared to the old location east of Kalispell.
“It’s something this community will be proud of for years,” Isaak said.
Flathead Youth Home is a shelter for kids, ages 10 through 18, in crisis. It is one of three attention homes in the state under the umbrella of Missoula’s Youth Homes Inc., a nonprofit organization that also provides group homes, wilderness treatment programs, foster care and adoption services. The shelters give kids who have emotional, social, protective, behavioral or chemical dependency issues an alternative to the streets.
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Lance Isaak, program director of the Flathead Youth Home, walks through the home’s main living room of their new facility in Kalispell. |
Geoff Birnbaum, executive director of Youth Homes in Missoula, said the emergency shelter model was first used in Boulder, Colo., in 1970. At the time, runaways would often be thrown in jail or put in detention centers, Birnbaum said. The same was true for other kids who may have committed an infraction as small as curfew violation. Some kids simply needed a safe place to go if there were problems at home.
“It just wasn’t effective,” Birnbaum said. “These kids hadn’t even committed a crime.”
Missoula opened a shelter in 1971. Since then Youth Homes has greatly expanded it programs, both in Missoula and elsewhere, with the first major move to another city coming in 1997 with the establishment of the Flathead Youth Home. Polson, Helena and Hamilton also provide services today. Kids are often referred by organizations such as youth court or child protective services.
The idea for shelter officials is to treat kids from their community, in their community. About 95 percent of kids at Flathead Youth Home are from Flathead and Lincoln counties. This increases the likelihood that they will maintain relationships with their family.
“We wanted to refute the notion that you send the kids out somewhere else,” Birnbaum said. “These kids we work with are all our kids.”
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Garrison Vrooman, with Swank Enterprises, builds a foundation before pouring another sidewalk section outside the new Flathead Youth Home facility in Kalispell. |
At an emergency shelter like the Flathead Youth Home, kids have access to a comfortable environment with adult role models, as well as counseling, mingling with other kids and time to figure out their next step. For instance, runaways can go to the youth home, instead of the streets, and discuss the problems at home, make sound decisions and get on the right track. Most of the youngsters remain in school.
Shelter employees and counselors can arrange dialogue with the parents if appropriate and help the kids decide whether they want to go back home or perhaps seek a new family. Kids stay anywhere from one day to several months.
“We’re not designed to be the end point,” Isaak said. “We offer new ways to deal with old problems.”
The Flathead Youth Home is licensed to care for up to eight kids at a time. The new home offers a balance of privacy and supervision for these kids. With 10 bedrooms – five upstairs and five downstairs – kids have their own rooms and are divided into girls on one level and boys on the other. The extra rooms provide the shelter with wiggle room to separate kids in certain situations, such as when there is an imbalance in the number of boys and girls.
The living area is purposely designed to be wide open and spacious. Without walls to inhibit vision, Isaak and other shelter employees can keep a constant eye on all of the kids from anywhere in the living area or the kitchen. When the kids want privacy, they have their rooms.
The kitchen has two refrigerators, along with a large pantry – eight hungry teenagers go through a lot of food. In the backyard, there is a concrete patio area that can be used for two of the kids’ favorite activities: basketball and skateboarding. Barbecues will be in order, as well. Birnbaum said the house is ideal for an emergency shelter.
“The design in Kalispell, it’s just evolutionary,” Birnbaum said. “It’s the best I’ve seen.”
A $450,000 federal grant has provided much of the funding for the new house. The Plum Creek Timber Co., Gallagher Foundation, Oro y Plata Foundation and private donations have also helped greatly, Isaak said. Isaak hopes for $1.1 million overall, which will be enough to eliminate mortgage payments. The perpetually under-funded shelter can’t afford to take on a hefty mortgage. Isaak said they have achieved 70 percent of the funding goal.
Flathead Youth Home will be holding an open house on May 28 from 1 p.m. to 6 p.m.
“Our kids aren’t being shuffled off somewhere else,” Isaak said. “They’re being taken care of here in a very nice place.”