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After 100 years, agency still puts the family first
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Happy 100th anniversary Family Service Agency: CEO of Family Service Agency Dave Arnold holds archived photographs of L-R FSA Founder and First Director Joseph Hanson, Tod Arrel who left part of his estate to FSA in 1927, and a ribbon cutting in 1976 that shows L-R Director of FSA James Bennett, Director of Mahoning County Children Services Mary Jo Credice, President of Junior Womens League Marilyn Wagmiller and Director of the Welfare Department Ezell Armour.
The agency got its start in 1908 as the Charity Organization Society.
YOUNGSTOWN — Identifying changing community needs and developing programs to meet them is key to the staying power of the Family Service Agency, which is celebrating its 100th anniversary this year.
It also involves terminating programs when their services are no longer relevant or provided elsewhere, such as foster care and adoptions, or the Learning Tree After-School Program, said David E. Arnold, president and chief executive officer.
“We couldn’t get enough kids to make Learning Tree work,” he said.
In fact, Arnold said, adjusting to the times and changing conditions and needs of clients accurately follows the agency’s mission statement, which says FSA is “dedicated to the changing needs of our community by providing an array of services that empower, enhance and strengthen families.”
FSA, which is accredited by the Council on Accreditation for Children and Family Services, is having its centennial anniversary dinner at 6:30 p.m. Tuesday at The Georgetown on South Avenue in Boardman.
According to agency history, researched by FSA, the organization got its start Feb. 15, 1908, under the guidance of Joseph Miles Hanson, as the Charity Organization Society. It’s primary purposes were to organize relief work and develop and coordinate agencies and services necessary to bring about “wholesome living conditions for the citizens of Youngstown.”
Some of the services and programs developed included: employment service, housing, lectures on bettering and beautifying the city, establishment of the Anti-Tuberculosis Association, establishment of a park commission, cleanup day, a fresh-air camp and the Equitable Loan Co.
Hanson believed that education would heal many of the nation’s social ills, a theory that led to the organization of the Children Service Bureau in 1917, as a subsidiary of the Charity Organization Society. Shortly thereafter, the scope of services provided by CSB was changed to include the prevention of cruelty to children.
In 1919, the Allied Council for Maintaining Standards of Family Life was created. It represented six agencies: Community Service Society, St. Vincent DePaul, Jewish Social Service Bureau, Salvation Army Relief Department, Youngstown Association for the Blind and the Anti-Tuberculosis Association.
Some of the council’s financial supporters included H.H. Stambaugh, H.M. Garlick, Robert Bentley, J.G. Butler Jr., David Tod Arrel, Wells Griswold, Mrs. G.S. Wilkerson, H.L. Round and Mrs. Warren Williamson.
During the 1920s, the agency was certified as a foster home provider, the first such in the Mahoning Valley. It also began establishing settlement houses, which evolved into the Associated Neighborhood Centers, to assist immigrants with socialization and advocacy.
The Haselton Settlement House was started in 1926, the Caldwell Settlement in 1928, and in the 1940s, the Lexington Settlement House was started in cooperation with the Youngstown Metropolitan Housing Authority.
In 1957, the Hanson Community Center, located in the Kimmel Brook Homes, was dedicated, and in the 1961, the Children Service Bureau became the Associated Neighborhood Centers, which assumed responsibility for the settlement houses. Children and Family Service focused on working with children through family intervention.
In the 1970s, the Rape Information and Counseling, Consumer Credit Counseling and Daybreak youth crisis center programs were developed. Also, in 1978, the agency moved to is present location at 535 Marmion Ave.
The focus of the Family Service Agency is to try to develop programs that meet community needs as they are discerned by the agency and others, Arnold said.
That’s the reason the agency has survived for so long,” said board of trustees Chairwoman Vicki Thompson of Poland Township. It has adapted to the changes in the community and in the structure of families. The board listens and observes and fills the gaps with a wide range of services, she said.
Arnold said the biggest change in the seven years he has been head of the agency is in the funding area. Until recently, fees for services, private insurance payments and Medicaid and Medicare reimbursements paid the bills. Now, the agency is having to conduct fundraisers and seek foundation funds to make ends meet, he said.
Arnold said there is a culture of commitment and service to clients that comes from the board and permeates the 58-member staff. Also, he said the staff works well with other agencies, from which most of FSA’s clients are referred.
“I can tell you from my experience of sitting on many board, the FSA board is my favorite. The staff is professional and knowledgeable and has all the credentials it needs to do the job and help the clientele,” Thompson said.
Also, staff members have an opportunity to talk to the board during meetings, giving the board all the information it needs to make decisions. “It is not a rubber stamp board,” she said.
John Manhollan of Hubbard, who is finishing his fourth year on the board, said he has been impressed with the growth in programs during his tenure, particularly in the areas of debt and foreclosure counseling. Also, he said the rape crisis service has become the “go-to” program for the Youngstown Police Department and area hospitals.
Thompson, who is going to soon be “termed off” the board, said she will miss it. “I’m proud to be able to say I chaired a board that has a 100-year history and that has done everything it could to help families survive and thrive.”
alcorn@vindy.com