Tuttie's Place is a 501 c (3) nonprofit corporation governed by a 9-member Board of Directors. The Mission of this community-based group foster care model is to establish and maintain a healing and nurturing environment that fosters discipline, commitment and excellence. TuTTie’s Place is unique in that it meets and teaches disconnected youth where they are so lessons and behaviors can be encouraged and easily translated into real life dynamics. By offering behavioral education and self-help tools, our staff mentors and guides youth to recognize their self-worth and to reach their full potential.My inspiration to found TuTTie’s Place in 1996 came from my personal experience fostering a troubled young child. I had become a therapeutic foster parent through a placement agency, and quickly realized the necessity for youth services that cater to young males who find themselves in unstable environments and without the skills to cope. While advocating for these youth services, I was recruited by the Citizen’s Review Board for Children (formally known as the Foster Care Review Board) to be a Volunteer Board Member. I listened to 25-30 cases per month of children in the foster care system, and was deeply affected by the decisions and circumstances that removed children from their biological families, and then separated them from their siblings. TuTTie’s was initially designed to keep sibling groups together, but throughout the years, a need for adolescent male services became more glaringly apparent and our services fulfilled this need. Our organization has grown from housing six youths in one home, to now housing 42 youth in a total of five homes. We are proud to say we have served over 250 young men, many of whom have graduated high school or from a GED program and gone on to higher education, have avoided the penal system, and now work to maintain their independence.Specialties: Founder and Executive Director, Foster Care, Non-profits, Child Care, Child Education, Board Member