Hermiston’s Faith-Based Advisory Committee wants to put an end to surfing – not board surfing, but couch surfing.
Whether or not many people in the community know it, there is what appears to be a growing number of kids – primarily teenagers – who don’t have a place to sleep at night. So they go from place to place – usually the homes of friends – to spend the night sleeping on the couch.
Many of the teens are at-risk kids who come from unstable homes. Pastor Dean Hackett of the Living Faith Church spoke to the Hermiston City Council this week to update them on the Faith-Based Advisory Committee’s work and its latest project – finding ways to help at-risk kids.
The committee’s first step was to try to get a grasp of the problem. To help the committee, Hackett invited Hermiston School Superintendent Dr. Fred Maiocco and David Hughes of Agape House to one of the committee’s meetings.
“We had a great discussion,” Hackett said. “But we realized we need a lot more time and we’ll continue evaluating the needs and see how they can be met.”
Hackett’s committee already has several community projects it is working on. The School Adoption Program involves church leaders and volunteers helping out at school events, such as serving popcorn at school functions, cleaning up school grounds or simply giving little gifts of appreciation to staff members. Hackett emphasizes there is no hidden agenda with the School Adoption Program. No one, he said, is preaching to the students or trying to convert new church members.
“We’re there to just help and show our appreciation,” he said. “And we’ve received some excellent reports from the principals of the schools.”
The Faith-Based Advisory Committee recently added a Mentoring Program to the Community Accountability Board or CAB.
CAB involves parents, the school district and the criminal justice system working with first-time juvenile offenders to ensure that their first offense is also their last offense. It’s a diversion program that allows juveniles to avoid the criminal justice system.
Mentors have an initial meeting with a troubled youth and his or her family over dinner, and then continue to visit with them over time in an effort to keep the youth on the right path.
“It’s going better than we could have anticipated,” said Hackett.
The committee is also in the process of getting a Neighborhood Revitalization Program off the ground, but Hackett said that is proving more difficult.
“We’re finding that project is larger than anticipated,” he told the council. “The challenge is finding enough volunteers. I can’t tell you at this point if we’re even close to getting it launched.”
In the meantime, Hackett’s committee is working with city leaders to assess the scope of problems facing at-risk youth. He said the committee isn’t interested in just paying lip service to the issue.
“We want to deal with real solutions and the sources of the problem – not surface issues,” he said.
Hermiston City Councilor Manuel Gutierrez said parents need to be responsible for their children throughout their teen-age years and added there are too many teens couch surfing because they aren’t welcome at home or simply have no place to stay. Hackett agreed.
“What was surprising to me was how many kids do what you call ‘couch surfing,’” he said. “I hope we can come up with some authentic solutions.”
Hermiston Mayor Dave Drotzmann thanked Hackett for his willingness to work on issues that affect the well-being of the community.
“Anything we can do to help, please let us know,” Drotzmann said.
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