by Caroline Gabsewics
Staff Writer
For 40 years, thousands of Jacksonville’s abused and abandoned children went through counseling and special programs at daniel’s Family Counseling Center on Belfort Road. Monday, those buildings were demolished to make way for a newer and safer temporary building that will later be replaced by a permanent building to help thousands more children just as it did in the past.
“It is bittersweet,” said Jim Clark, daniel’s CEO and president, about Monday’s demolition. “Sweet because it is something that will be beneficial to the kids and staff. But you hate to see something you used just being thrown away. You have to throw it away and move on.”
The buildings being demolished were also meant to be a temporary structure when they were placed there in the 1960s, but they were never replaced. Madison Shelly, vice president of development for daniel, said it was never intended for those buildings to be there that long. But, because of budget constraints, they were never replaced.
Clark said the buildings looked fine from the outside, but the inside needed a lot of work.
“We did a lot of patching,” he said. “It got to the point where we couldn’t insure the building anymore and we were constantly repairing it.”
He added that this is just a temporary solution.
“There was a health and quality hazard,” said Clark. “We had to instantly do something.”
Over the next few weeks the rubble left behind from the demolition will be removed and temporary modular buildings will take its place. Shelly said they are hoping the new buildings will be operational within 30 days.
Funding for demolition — and for the purchase of the new modular buildings — was set aside. But in the next year, daniel will begin raising the funds to build a permanent Family Counseling Center.
“We will begin pursuing that in a year or sooner,” said Shelly. “There is a lot of preparation that must go on behind the scenes.”
When daniel is ready to build the permanent building, it will go on the same site it has been for the past 40 years.
“You bloom where you are planted,” said Clark. “We hope city officials and others in the community will help us care for our children.
“As the government continues to cut back, the more we rely on donations.”
While daniel may be losing some of its funding from the City due to the property tax issue the City is facing, Clark and Shelly are currently focusing on the new temporary building.
“The Family Counseling Center is for people who first come to daniel,” said Clark. “We want to keep this environment as attractive as possible and make their first impression more friendly.
“Kids always remember their first impression.”
Clark added that the ambiance and environment affect kids dramatically.
“That is why we want to keep it a family-like atmosphere as much as we can,” he said.
Until the new temporary buildings are in place, the counselors, therapists, nurses and other employees who were in the Family Counseling Building will be dispersed to different locations around Jacksonville — some in buildings daniel used to occupy and others in buildings that were previously used as storage facilities for daniel.
Many of the employees were at the demolition on Monday watching as their offices and counseling rooms were flattened.
“It is hard taking your eyes off of it,” said Shelly.
daniel was established in Jacksonville in 1884 and started out as an orphanage. It has evolved into an agency that assists abused, neglected and emotionally-troubled children and their families. Just last week, Clark said, they had 1,731 cases. Of those cases, some children are in the foster care program, others receive in-house counseling and others are in group homes or in independent living facilities. Many of the children are in middle school or high school, but daniel also helps children as young as 4 years old.