House Community Budget Issue Requests - Tracking Id #977 The Rosalie Center
Requester:	Bonnie Christiano		Organization:		Alpha House of Tampa, Inc.
Project Title:	The Rosalie Center		Date Submitted:		01/31/2000 9:23:53 AM
District Member:	Bob Henriquez		Service Area:		Statewide
Counties Affected:	Hillsborough
Recipient:	Alpha House of Tampa, Inc.		Contact:		Bonnie Christiano
	208 S. Tampania Avenue		Contact Phone:		(813) 875-2024 25
	Tampa, FL 33609
Project Description:
Alpha House of Tampa, Inc. is the only licensed maternity home in Hillsborough County, Florida. Its mission is to provide opportunities for pregnant women in crisis to create promising lives. Alpha provides safe housing during and after pregnancy, education and counseling, parenting skills training, vocational support and spiritual support. In 1991, Alpha was designated as President George Bush's 513th Point of Light. In 1997, the agency conducted a needs assessment to determine the major barriers to success for it's mothers. Three were identified: safe housing, child care and transportation. Currently, Alpha consists of the maternity residence with 20 bedrooms (always filled with a waiting list) and three transition homes that can serve up to eight mothers and their babies. Obviously there is a gap between the number of people who need transitional housing and the availability of beds. With a gift of land in 1997 across the street from the maternity residence, Alpha began planning to better meet the needs of its clients. The organization decided to develop the land with a facility containing a child care center for up to 45 children, eight additional transitional efficiency apartments, community meeting space and administrative office space. The new facility will be named The Rosalie Center after Alpha's first executive director, Sister Rosalie Hennessey, OSM. The child care center will be operated in collaboration with The Child Abuse Council. The Child Abuse Council is a nationally recognized agency offering a variety of services to reduce child abuse. In addition to construction of The Rosalie Center, Alpha needs to renovate its existing facilities with new carpeting in the maternity residence, new stoves and refrigerators in all four buildings and new roofs on all four buildings. To assist with transportation, Alpha need two vehicles - a 15 passenger van to transport large groups and a mini-van for smaller groups. The agency transports clients to school, substance abuse recovery programs and medical appointments. Residents rely on public transportation for their other needs.
Services Provided/Benefit to State:
Alpha serves the State of Florida in four key areas. First, Alpha assists in the delivery of healthy babies to women at high risk for premature and low birth weight babies. Each low birth weight baby costs the State $45,000 to care for from birth through discharge. Consequently, Alpha potentially saves the State between $1.5 and $2 million each year. This does not count the long term costs of caring for the problems associated with low birth weight. These include failure to thrive, attention deficit, health issues such as asthma and the tendency of low birth weight infants to do less well in adulthood as parents and tax paying citizens. Second, Alpha helps welfare mothers become and remain employed. Each woman off welfare saves $7,716 per year just in food stamps and TANF benefits. Third, the agency helps women find safe, appropriate housing for themselves and their families. This translates into savings for the State of $1,600 for each family not living in a homeless shelter. In 1999, this equaled nearly $92,000. Finally, with the addition of The Rosalie Center, Alpha will help each child in its care maximize his or her developmental potential. These benefits are virtually incalculable. They include improved school performance, better health and higher functioning adults who are tax payers as opposed to tax burdens.
Measurable Outcome Anticipated:
1. Each woman will deliver a healthy, normal birth weight baby as measured by birth weight and APGAR score. APGAR is a rating of the baby's appearance, respiration, color, response, etc. at one minute and five minutes after birth. 2. Each woman will become and remain employed. This is measured by educational status, job placement and job retention. 3. Each woman will have appropriate housing for herself and her child(ren) when she leaves Alpha. This is measured by housing status; i.e. lease, rent reciept, mortgage payment, relative placement. 4. Each child in Alpha's care will maximize his or her developmental potential. This will be measured by developmental test scores for the child and improvement in parenting skills test scores for the parent(s).
Amount requested from the State for this project this year:				$329,000
Total cost of the project:		$2,129,000

Request has been made to fund:			Operations and Construction
Is there Local Government or Private match for this request?					Yes
	Cash Amount:	$488,100		In-Kind Amount:	$217,500
Was this project previously funded by the State?					No
Is future-year funding likely to be requested?					No
Was this project included in an Agency's Budget Request?					No
Was this project included in the Governor's Recommended Budget?					No
Is there a documented need for this project?					Yes
	Documentation:	Hills. Co. plan, Alpha needs assessment, Homeless Coalition of H.C. assessment
Was this project request heard before a publicly noticed meeting of a body of elected officials (municipal, county, or state)?					No