Joe's Place

Nebraska has been in the national news for weeks over the law it enacted in February to protect the welfare of abandoned children.

Probably no other “safe haven” law in the nation has received more than a fraction of the publicity. What made the Nebraska effort more newsworthy was the difference between the law’s intent and how it actually was being used.

Safe-haven laws typically are designed to protect newborns. If a parent or parents are unable to care for such a child, safe-haven laws allow them to put the child in the custody of a hospital or public safety worker without fear of prosecution.

Missouri’s Safe Place for Newborns Act, for example, provides immunity from prosecution for abandonment to parents who voluntarily relinquish control of a child up to 5 days old to a hospital, health care provider, law enforcement officer, firefighter or emergency medical technician — provided the child has not been abused.

Illinois’ Abandoned Newborn Infant Protection Act offers this kind of immunity to parents of children up to 7 days old.

As originally enacted, however, Nebraska’s law applied to children as old as 18. Suddenly, the state seemed to become a dumping ground for teens whose families could not — or would not — care for them. There was a lesson in this, both bitter and constructive.

Of 36 children involved after the original Nebraska bill became law, only one was an infant. Thirty were 11 years old or older. A majority were teenagers, and five were brought to Nebraska from elsewhere. On Nov. 21, the Nebraska legislature amended the law, limiting its protections to parents of children up to 30 days old.

But the change of the Nebraska law does nothing to change the heartbreaking reality of teens who need safe haven, and not only in Nebraska.

Convenant House of Missouri estimates that between 1,000 and 1,500 teenagers experience homelessness in the St. Louis region. In Maplewood-Richmond Heights, people are marking the second anniversary of a project that demonstrates how ordinary people can come together to stabilize the lives of young people.

They call it “Joe’s Place,” a well-tended frame house that has become home to nine high school boys living on the edge of homelessness.

Children come to Joe’s Place through voluntary agreement of their parents and guardians. Dan Reeve, 33, and his wife, Alyssa, 28, have been the live-in house parents since it opened in January 2007.

Mr. Reeve is a middle-school reading specialist in the Maplewood-Richmond Heights School District. Ms. Reeve stays at home with the couple’s 2 ½-year-old son and helps care for the teens.

Family life at Joe’s Place centers around dinner time, Mr. Reeve told us, when everyone reviews the day. There are assigned chores and homework time, with lights out at 11 p.m.

Mr. Reeve says the community effort has been “amazing,” especially when you “look at the list of all who help in a week’s or month’s time.” The project got its start through a $10,000 gift from an anonymous giver named “Joe.” The district pays the $27,000 annual expense for the mortgage, utilities and insurance. School district employees have contributed more than $8,000.

Private donors are working to pay off the mortgage. Others take the boys shopping for clothes twice a year, bring home-cooked meals and donate school supplies and toiletries.

“These are boys who had been in survival mode when it comes to food, clothing and, in some cases, staying warm, left to plan hour to hour,” he said.

What he and his wife find most rewarding, Mr. Reeve said, is watching these boys at home, getting to “see them be kids, enjoying normal things.”

Is there any better way to define a “safe haven” for teens?