Over at the Human Development Center (HDC) in Superior, staff are lending a hand to homeless Youth and teen runaways. HDC offers mental health services, addiction recovery, and community crisis response.

Some of the biggest reasons why teens runaway from home are unresolved conflict, or lack of communication. Project Reach Out does provide mediation efforts to help reunite homeless youth with their families.

KayLa Polson is a program supervisor with HDC. She says there are times when returning a child to their family is not always the the best option. Polson says the Human Development Center also tries lending a hand to homeless youth through their drop-in-center.

“We’re able to connect them with the resources basic needs that they need. Clothes, hygiene items, food and our folks serve as kind of like case managers,” Polson said. “So things like job applications, housing applications, insurance, getting onto food assistance. Stuff with the County we’re able to kind of help provide all of those things.”

HDC provides 24-hour crisis intervention services, family mediation, and other services for runaway teens. Project Reach Out is also 100% funded by grants and donations. However, there will be significant cuts next year due to the lack of grants available.

“We also have a drop-in center it’s open from three to seven Monday through Friday. Youth are able to come and get a warm meal,” Polson said. “They’re able to participate in activities, there’s different movie nights, and art nights. Sometimes they have teaching curriculum. They can access the free store where they’re able to get the clothes, and the hygiene items that they need.”

For more information about the Human Development Center in Superior you can read more here. Also for another story about Project Reach Out you can read that here.