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Spreading hope

Hope Harbor to expand to include a boys home

Photo by Jody Isaackson Executive Director for Hope Harbor Ministry Cindy McKittrick shares a diagram of the prospective layout of a new boys home near Crooks, South Dakota.The plans include starting with one of three possible houses and one outbuilding. The house will hold about six to eight boys, McKittrick said. The outbuilding will be where the classroom is and two offices, one for the site director and one for the counselor.

MARSHALL — Hope Harbor of Marshall and Winona have heretofore served teen girls and is now expanding to South Dakota with a boys home.

Hope Harbor had received a donation of 13 acres land roughly a mile southwest of Crooks, a suburb of Sioux Falls, S.D., on which to build a boys home, Executive Director for Hope Harbor Ministry Cindy McKittrick said Thursday.

“We’re excited about being able to expand and to be able to work with teen boys,” McKittrick said. “I just feel there’s a need for that service.”

McKittrick and expansion coordinator Claudia Stenson have been working on the project since February 2016, driving to Sioux Falls once a month for planning meetings.

“We have been talking to a group of people in Sioux Falls about the possibility of a boys home in Sioux Falls, and there is a need,” McKittrick said. “My coming on board in 2016 has allowed Claudia to focus on expansion.”

Their expansion team includes the following Sioux Falls residents as well as the two from Marshall: Jeff Rodman, contractor Dan Lemme, Kurt and Val Huisken, Cody Huisken, Don Jacobs, Cheryl Moe and Jay Woudstra, superintendent of the Sioux Falls Christian Schools.

“These are the core group,” McKittrick said. “There are other people in Sioux Falls that support us as well.”

The idea came up when a couple from Sioux Falls took their son to a House of Hope facility quite some distance away.

Each site, including Marshall and Winona girls schools, have a three-hour radius, McKittrick said. So, the rural Crooks acreage does extend into southwest Minnesota and Northwest Iowa.

Also at each site will be a full-time teacher, full-time counselor and full- and part-time staff.

The staff assist resident teens with household chores such as cooking and laundry, take them to chapel during the week and to community churches on Sunday.

“They generally do life (skills) with the girls,” McKittrick said. “They also work on service projects with them

“The plan includes hiring a site director a little further along,” McKittrick said. “We have about a year, yet, before taking applications (for boys).”

McKittrick shared a diagram of the prospective layout.The plans include starting with one of three possible houses and one outbuilding. The house will hold about six to eight boys, she said. The outbuilding will be where the classroom is and two offices, one for the site director and one for the counselor.

“If the demand is there and it stays full, we will build a second house,” McKittrick said. There are three houses total in the plan.

Already, the plan has about $500,000 in pledges.

“We would like to raise $1.5 million before starting to build,” McKittrick said. “That would cover construction and operational expenses. The next step would be to run a capital campaign in Sioux Falls to raise the rest.”

Currently, the project’s site plan has been through a rezoning process with the Minnehaha County and is now before the Crooks City Council, McKittrick said.

With the new facility, Hope Harbor can continue to live up to its mission statement, to “equip teens, empower parents and serve those in need by anchoring them to the hope of God’s promises.”

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