The Iowa office of Girls and Boys Town has completed a move from Glenwood to Council Bluffs. Spokeswoman Katina Gordon says the Iowa office opened fifteen years ago. She says in addition to this one “across the river” from the original Boys Town in Omaha, there are 19 programs in fifteen states, helping a record 46-thousand kids nationwide last year.
Gordon adds, “At least 117 families and 245 children were in Iowa.” The original Father Flanagans Boys Home today works with state and local agencies to help troubled families. At the Iowa locations, services include family preservation, foster family services, and visitation for families ordered to have supervised visits.
Gordon says another thing that’s unique is the setting for the family-based services they offer. It’s — home. “We believe in the strength of families …and teaching families how to work together in their own home family environment.” Gordon says the counseling teams often work with more than one issue. She cites a client family that recently got counseling for violence issues as well as problems like mold in their house.
The Girls and Boys Town team helped the family find new housing, childcare while the parents worked, and got the battling parents into domestic-violence counseling. The move to Council Bluffs puts the Iowa office closer to the center of its service area in western Iowa and eastern Nebraska, and closer to other agencies they often work with, as well as being at the junction of two Interstate Highways and easier to travel to.
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