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	February 14, 2011 SC Healthy Family Formation Coalition E-News!   Have you noticed lately that “mutual responsibility’ has replaced the term ‘personal responsibility’?   These two terms are not interchangeable.  They have vastly different meanings and implications for how we deal with the fiscal and social issues facing our nation. Americans are the most generous people in the world and many help those in need become self-sufficient. The goal is self-sufficiency, not dependency on government entitlements. Mutual responsibility means that “we are all in this together” and if folks have created chaos in their lives because of poor choices and need a ‘safety net’ then those with resources (jobs, money, handouts, welfare) must give [up] their ‘fair share’ to make it just. Personal or individual responsibility means that each person is held accountable for the behaviors, messes, and chaos that they create. We mature as we own our actions and learn not to blame others for our choices. This is called growing up! By taking personal responsibility for our actions, we learn to make better, smarter, and wiser decisions because we know how those actions will influence others. This entitlement mentality is bankrupting our nation to the tune of $112 billion each and every year for unwed childbearing and divorce alone. That's $312 million per day to subsidize chaotic family formation! Long-term entitlements have never helped anyone grow up. Instead of taking responsibility for poor choices and learning how to make better choices in the future, those trapped in the welfare system are enslaved for life.  By redistributing the wealth through entitlements, we also spread around the misery. Eventually, everyone involved ends up miserable, poor, and aspiring to nothing better. Which America do we want?     National Marriage Week USA  (February 7-14) http://nationalmarriageweekusa.org/ New research reports that the percentage of United States’ adults who are married has dropped from 78 percent in 1970 to 57 percent in 2008, according to the recently released report, “The Marriage Index,” co-published by the Institute for American Values and the National Center on African American Marriages and Parenting (NCAAMP).   Even more concerning, 40 percent of all American children today are born out-of-wedlock and 71 percent of African American children are born without married parents. Read more and Watch the webinar…       More on Entitlements and Chaotic Family Formation Our last SCHFF newsletter addressed the need for fiscal and social conservatives to work together to shrink entitlements by strengthening the family.   Last week, Pulitzer Prize winning Journalist Dr. Colbert King vividly described many of my points in his Washington Post column, Long-term decline of the black family nothing to celebrate. King complained that we must do more than build bigger ‘safety nets’ around fragile families if we want the African American family to be restored.  Read King’s column here…           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