History & Development
In fall of 1973, a small group of parents from Pheasant Ridge neighborhood (then known as Mark IV Apartments) came together out of concern for their neighborhood. They were troubled by high incidences child abuse, vandalism and disputes among neighbors. They decided what they needed was a place where families could come together for community gatherings and activities for children. The group approached the apartment management and was granted the use of a three-bedroom apartment to serve as the first Neighborhood Center. Meanwhile, the University of Iowa School of Social Work helped recruit volunteers to organize afterschool and teen programs. Since 1973, the Pheasant Ridge Center has offered on-site educational and recreational opportunities, connected people to resources in the community, and encouraged a sense of community.
The success of the Pheasant Ridge center prompted the Iowa City community to support the addition of a second Center. In 1988, we expanded our efforts to the Broadway Street neighborhood. Like Pheasant Ridge in 1973, the need for prevention programs was evident in the disproportionate number of child abuse cases, police reports and juveniles on probation. Neighborhood Centers joined forces with Head Start and built a 6,000 square foot facility in 1990. Since the Broadway Street Neighborhood Center has been in operation, the quality of life in the neighborhood has improved, as seen by the decrease in child abuse reports. In 1995, we started work in the western part of Johnson County, bringing resources and programs to some of the underserved mobile home parks in that area. In 1996, we opened the Clear Creek Neighborhood Center.
The Neighborhood Center concept is unique in that we bring programs to the people who would otherwise have difficulty accessing services, either because of transportation, child care, or financial constraints. In addition to neighborhood-based services, an important function of our agency is to connect our neighbors to other resources in the community. We are also very reliant upon partnerships with a diverse array of community agencies, institutions and businesses. Our shared efforts have added value to our programming and yielded important successes for families. Through collaborative work with partners such as the Iowa City and Clear Creek schools, Iowa City Police Department, Wendell Johnson Speech and Hearing Center, United Action for Youth, MECCA, and the Sixth Judicial District, neighborhoods are safer, children are healthier and better prepared for school, adults are returning to school and learning new job and life skills, parents and children are learning English, and people in all of our neighborhoods are discovering and rediscovering what it means to be part of a neighborhood and community.
Over the years Neighborhood Centers’ methods have evolved to meet the changing needs of our neighborhoods and our community. One striking example is in the area of child care. The welfare reform initiatives of the 1990s created a great demand for full-day childcare. As more parents move from welfare to work, we retooled the agency to meet these changing demands. As a measure of the increased demand, it is worth noting that in 1995 we offered a total of 12 childcare spaces in our cooperative - this year we have 106 full day childcare spaces. We are also very proud of the quality of our early childhood programs. In 1998, the National Association for the Education of the Young Child (NAEYC) accredited childcare programs at Broadway and Pheasant Ridge.
This past year, we maintained our efforts in areas outside of Iowa City as we continued prevention programs in the Clear Creek area of western Johnson County. In addition, we were the recipients of United Way special needs funding. The grant has helped us respond to some of the requests for services and support from senior citizens in Tiffin and surrounding areas. We have also continued to see significant change in the population in the Pheasant Ridge area. Sudanese refugees now represent a solid majority of families in the neighborhood. This year we implemented a new Even Start Literacy grant for Pheasant Ridge that allowed us to add ESL and GED classes and additional literacy programming for young children. We also continued the PREP program (Preschoolers Reaching Educational Potential). PREP as an intensive 11-week summer program intended to prepare children for kindergarten.
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