April 6, 2018 at 1:53 p.m.
AGENCY'S ANNIVERSARY
At 40, CMS continues to support young moms
Sister Maureen Joyce, RSM, first director of the Catholic Charities agency, befriended Mrs. Thomas, placing her in a residence for pregnant teenagers where she received prenatal care. Then Sister Maureen accompanied the teen to the delivery room when her daughter, La Keya Louise, was born.
"She told me that I could do it," Mrs. Thomas said of becoming a mother. But "she never pushed me one way or the other."
That was three decades ago. CMS staffers taught Mrs. Thomas about breastfeeding and parenting, watched her children while she studied for her GED diploma, helped furnish her living space and supplied her with formula and clothes.
"Without those worries, all I had to do was go to school and go to work," Mrs. Thomas said. CMS also took her in as a volunteer administrative assistant and, later, as a staffer.
Then and now
This year, CMS celebrates its 40th anniversary - and the life of Sister Maureen, who died last year. The agency was founded by Rev. Richard Downs and started as a single residential program serving pregnant teens throughout the 14 counties of the Albany Diocese.
Today, CMS offers adoption services, foster care services, support programs in seven rural counties, community-based programs, day care, respite care and more.
An Albany-based outreach program provides services for parents with developmental disabilities or mental illnesses, anger management support and crisis intervention.
In the late 1980s, Sister Maureen also opened the Farano Center for Children as a CMS home specifically for HIV-positive, abandoned babies, many of whom also suffered from special physical needs.
Today, that center serves children with mental health, behavioral or emotional needs who have been removed from their homes due to abuse or neglect.
The types of services at CMS have evolved over the years to meet changing needs, but the mission has always been the same.
"The most important thing we've done is to be able to assist young women in bringing their babies to term," said Sister Mary Ann LoGiudice, RSM, CMS director since 1990 and a staff member since 1978. "It sort of speaks to helping people through generations. I think that was certainly Sister Maureen's vision."
Support services
Valerie Bochenek, associate executive director for outreach services, emphasized the emotional benefits for CMS clients.
"Most of them have very non-supportive families," she said of her clients in Fulton and Montgomery Counties, where she is also program director. "They will share things with us. They really have no one else to talk to."
CMS programs in rural counties advocate for teenagers to return to school, win custody of their children and receive financial support from fathers. The teenagers' parents and grandparents, as well as the father of the babies, often seek counseling and job assistance, too.
"It's a very complex issue," Mrs. Bochenek said. "It isn't just a teen with a baby anymore."
For example, Mrs. Thomas remembered calling Sister Maureen for advice on anything from career decisions to raising a puppy.
"It was not uncommon for us to be on the phone until 11 at night," she said, laughing. "She mothered me. I believe that God puts people in your life for a purpose."
Mrs. Thomas' mother died when she was five, and she didn't get along with her stepmother. "I was a wreck. I had no business having a child," she said.
Without CMS, "my sister probably would have ended up raising my daughter. I got a blessing my mother didn't have."
Meeting needs
Recent New York State funding cuts to the Maternity and Early Childhood Foundation - which funds agencies that serve low-income, expectant and new parents - have forced CMS to lay off a few of its 130 staff members. But grants, donations and other sources fill the gaps; Catholic Charities allocated $75,000 last year.
"The state has given and the state has taken away," Mrs. Bochenek said.
Although the national teen birth rate fell to a record low in 2009, the need for CMS' services still exists. More than 36,000 teenagers between 15 and 19 gave birth in New York State in 2009. Montgomery County ranked highest outside of New York City; Fulton County ranked seventh.
"There's nothing else in my counties that begin to serve my populations," Mrs. Bochenek noted.
Her goal is to recruit businesses, schools, politicians and other groups to create sustainable mentoring and education programs as a community.
"I would love to see some outpouring of compassionate interest and assistance," she said. "My clients are babies, too - and they're babies that never really got what they needed."
• Deborah, 18 years old and five months pregnant, has lived at CMS' Heery Center for Young Families for three months. She studies for her GED diploma and hopes to enter veterinary college; as she prepares for motherhood, she's learned about safe sleep techniques and sudden infant death syndrome. "It helped me to understand a lot and get me ready for being a mother," she said of CMS. "I would have no other place to go."
• Thao, 16, and her one-year-old daughter Ke'Leaha have lived at the Heery Center for 10 months. The baby stayed at the home's day care while Thao earned a construction license and college credit in building sciences. She wants to become a detective after she earns her diploma. "They helped me and her stay together," she said of CMS. "They pushed me to do things" like spend more time with Ke'Leaha and develop patience.
CMS will hold an anniversary dinner and fundraiser May 25 at the Century House in Latham. For more information and to RSVP by May 23, call 482-8836.[[In-content Ad]]
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