PLATFORM : Helping Neighbors

The Westminster association is a neighborhood center. We have three low-income day-care centers. We have program for self-esteem. We have a tutorial program for young kids every evening. We have a program we call “The Creative Child,” working with 50 children with behavior problems. Most of those children, in the 17 years we’ve had this program, have become A and B students.

The hardest thing is raising funds for all of the things that need to be done (especially with a recession looming). We need a year’s funds for staff and equipment for a gymnasium that’s being built.

Also, there are so many girls out here under 17 who are having babies. We have an infant-care building complete and ready for occupancy, but we have not been able to raise enough funds to open it. The cost of running it averages about $120 a week per baby because of state requirements. We want to get these young people--these are 12-, 13- and 15-year-old girls--back in school and keep them off the welfare rolls.