Statewide Chair Mary McLellan Heritage Community Services Regional Chairs Mariscia Cooper (Pee Dee) Charlie Lybrand (Lowcountry) Lenna Neill (Upstate) Rev. Randy Riddle (Grand Strand) Dr. Roger Rollins (CSRA) Charlotte Valentine-Green (Ace Basin)   Advisory Council Eugene Bacote Darlington School District Dr. Vera Bailey Hilton Head Preg. Care Center Pamela Berry Colleton Fire and Rescue Dr. Vonda Calcutt Lowcountry Ctr. Diabetes Sen. Chip Campsen Charleston/Berkeley Rev. Chuck Coward Charleston Outreach Robin Crosby Colleton County Ligure Ellington Ret.Capt. Charleston City Police Dr. Randy Goings Chiropractic Physician Faye Hill Lowcountry Pregnancy Center & SC Association Pregnancy Care Centers WC Hoecke Fatherhood Practioner Leroy Lewis Upward Bound at Cof C Norman L. Moore, Jr. Colonel, USAFR(Ret) Cyndi Mosteller Comm. for Higher Education Alexia Newman Carolina Pregnancy Center Fred Payne Marriage Savers of Upstate Jerry & Barbara Seymour R& R Marriage Min. Ronald Shoupe Colleton County Dr. A. V. Strong A Better Way, Inc. (Gang Out) Dr. Robert Thomas Pulmonary Medicine Pastor Phil Thrailkill St. Luke UMC Hartsville Kelly Walker Upstate Fatherhood Coalition	November 11, 2010 SC Healthy Family Formation Coalition E-News!   South Carolina spends $469 million each and every year on entitlement programs due to divorce and unwed childbearing. Almost $5 billion every decade is spent on welfare programs that incentivize chaotic family formation known to promote generational poverty and misery.   Most entitlement programs were meant to be safety nets, not social prisons with few escapes.      Now, is the time for social and fiscal conservatives to work together to shrink the size of entitlement programs by creating incentives and eliminating disincentives for healthy family formation.   There should be few, if any, benefits for chaotic family formation.   This was the idea behind Welfare Reform of 1996 which, while it was followed, succeeded at moving 2.8 million Americans (many were single mothers) off the welfare rolls and into jobs.   Fragile families are defined as families that begin when a child is born outside of marriage. Over the past decade, social science research has gathered more than enough data to show that children born and/or raised in fragile families are at great disadvantage in the midst of miserable poverty.   Today, more than 70% of black children, 50% Hispanic children, and almost 30% of white children are born outside of marriage resulting in families lacking the resilience to survive and thrive.    A child of a single mother is seven times more likely to live in poverty than the child of married parents.   Yet, there is a time tested and proven ideal life script that is best for children, families, and society.  Get an education, then get married, and then start your family.    Until healthy family formation is taken seriously and rewarded by policy makers we will not make progress.  It will take tough policies that go beyond just reducing the risks of sexual activity through so-called safe sex education, birth control and abortion.      It will take courage and determination to shift the focus to avoiding the risks by teaching our kids and adults how to build healthy relationships, date instead of hook-up, pursue education and job training, become a mature productive self-sufficient citizen, establish a sustainable marriage and then raise children in safe and stable families.   It will not be easy for South Carolinians to dig their way out of $31 billion debt, shrink the size of government, increase graduation rates and create productive jobs.  But it will be bearable for all of us taxpayers when we know that our children will experience life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness.       Follow the SC-HFF Coalition on Twitter!   Join the Heritage Keepers® Facebook Cause
	The South Carolina Healthy Family Formation Coalition (SC HFF Coalition) is organized and staffed by Heritage Community Services. The SC HFF Coalition promotes child and family well-being by providing opportunities for statewide communication about such issues as: adolescent pregnancy, unwed childbearing, fatherlessness, sexual exploitation of our youth, dating violence and domestic violence, child abuse and neglect, gang activity and youth violence.    Coalition members support healthy family formation initiatives that integrate character-based life skills, teen pregnancy prevention with an emphasis on abstinence-centered education, and the importance of fidelity-within-marriage.   Together we can impact our culture so that forming healthy families becomes a norm, rather than the exception, for South Carolina. Please, forward this E-News to interested friends, family and colleagues and ask them to consider joining the Coalition. Join/Subscribe Unsubscribe PRIVACY POLICY: Information you share will never be sold, rented, or given to any third party. Contact Mary McLellan , Statewide Chairman (843)654-7740 ext.122