Keeping the doors of teen shelter open cost shelter's founders their own home
'We just couldn't let the kids go.' - Sunny Rice Kids 2 Kids co-founder
By Michelle Knight knight@theacorn.com

JANN HENDRY/Acorn Newspapers SELFLESS- Kids 2 Kids executive director Kris Giles, left, smiles with one of the program's graduates, Sarah Lockfort, 18. Giles, who has lost her own home in an effort to keep the program afloat, says the Kids 2 Kids continues to struggle financially.

Sunny Rice and her daughter, Kris Giles, gave up their Camarillo home so a group of atrisk teenage girls wouldn't have to leave theirs.

Rice, 65, and Giles, 39, mortgaged their 2,000squarefoot Camarillo home to finance Restoration House, a group home for teenage girls in Ojai.

Rice and Giles are now included among the growing number of people across the country facing loan default. Last week, Rice moved out of the four-bedroom house she has called home for six years in anticipation of foreclosure and into a Camarillo mobile home rental.

"We couldn't just let the kids go," Rice said of losing her home. "It's not a money-making thing- you're there because of the kids."

Rice and Giles founded Kids 2 Kids in 1976 to help the less fortunate but expanded the nonprofit's mission in 2005 when they opened the 17bedroom group home.

The mother-daughter team planned for Restoration House to provide a safe, stable and drug-free environment in a homelike setting for some 18 atrisk girls- some with mental health issues, others with behavioral, drug or alcohol problems.

To run a home for more than six girls, the women had to apply for a Ventura County conditional use permit. To make the many improvements required for the permit, the women needed money and lots of it.

The only way to get the money, they said, was to refinance their Camarillo home.

Complications The women said the county delayed granting the permit and continued to add to their everincreasing list of required improvements.

T w o years and $280,000 later, Rice and Giles had exhausted their money and still had no permit.

Kids 2 Kids board member David McKenzie said it was frustrating to see Rice and Giles make the improvements to the home in Ojai only to have the county and fire department say more was needed.

"That type of thing went on over and over from the day we moved in," said McKenzie, an executive with Gold Coast Broadcasting. "It felt wrong. At the end, I was getting very suspicious that someone at the county on some level didn't want us to have this home."

In the meantime, Kids 2 Kids opened Serenity House, a smaller group home in Ventura last year.They shut down the Ojai home earlier this year, moving Restoration House to a smaller home in Casitas Springs.

But Rice and Giles still had a big problem.

Their income as administrators of the two group homes wasn't enough to meet the $4,500 monthly bill for the new $650,000 mortgage and line of credit on their Camarillo home.

Their monthly mortgage payment had been $1,200, almost one-fourth the new tab, on the original loan amount of $320,000, Giles said.

She admits she and Rice made poor financial decisions but had the best of intentions.

"We pulled that money out to give these girls a chance," Giles said. "So how could you regret doing that?"

Countrywide spokesperson Jumana Bauwens said the company will review the women's case to see if anything can be done to help.

Nonetheless, Giles said keeping the two group homes running though losing the home she owned jointly with her mother "is absolutely worth it.

"Even if I drop dead tomorrow, it's so important that these homes stay open," Giles said. "They're wounded kids, and if we can restore something that they lost a long time ago, which is hope . . . that shows them that we do care."

When Rice retired recently as administrator of Restoration House, Giles took over operating both group homes.She moved to Ventura several months ago to be closer to the homes.

The divorced mother of two teenage daughters also acts as the executive director for Kids 2 Kids. To supplement her income, Giles has a part-time job as a trade show presenter.

What now?

Board member McKenzie said the nonprofit has to focus now on making itself operate in the black.

County law requires any group home with more than six juveniles, as was the case with the Ojai home, to meet a number of government regulations, many of which are very costly.

The Ojai home needed more than 12 girls in residence to sustain itself, McKenzie said.

To control expenses and avoid the laundry list of county permit conditions, Kids 2 Kids will maintain homes that have no more than six girls, he said.

But limiting each house to six girls also limits the nonprofit's monthly income because the county pays per resident. The nonprofit is barely keeping its head above water.

Expenses for both houses run around $54,000 a month and many months exceed income, Giles said.

The nonprofit breaks even with 11 children.

Payroll for around-the-clock, highlytrained staff of 18, including full- and part-time therapists, counselors and childcare workers, accounts for the lion's share of the income, Kids 2 Kids officials said.

Giles said the ratio for most group homes is one staff person to every six children. At Kids 2 Kids, the ratio is one staff member to every four girls.

Success story

Former Kids 2 Kids resident Sarah Lockfort said the individualized attention made a difference.

At 16, Lockfort lived for nearly a year in a large facility for abused and neglected children before treatment experts said she'd benefit from a setting that was more homelike. They sent her to the Ojai Restoration House group home.

Lockfort said the staff there was more understanding.

"(The therapist) had a lot more time to talk to us," said Lockfort, who's now 18 and living on her own.

"It was like a little family."

The personal attention helped Lockfort flourish.

By age 17, she had four parttime jobs and enough school credits to attend high school part-time. The staff provided her with transportation and anything else she needed, Lockfort said.

Lockfort moved back in with her father and graduated from Newbury Park High School in June.

She recently moved back to Ojai, where she works part-time and volunteers at the Casitas Springs Restoration House. She wants to become a mentor to the girls in the group home.

"They helped me a lot, and I hope someday I can do something that would help them," Lockfort said.

McKenzie said Lockfort is one of their many success stories. The nonprofit's long-term goal is to open more small group homes to help girls like Lockfort.

He said that at any given time there are as many as 100 girls 12 years old and older who sit in juvenile hall because there is no place for them to go.

Giles and Rice remain optimistic for the future of the group homes and are adamant that they stay open.

Giles looks for financial help from the community- donations from individuals, community and business groups and the Kids 2 Kids annual toy run, which was held last Saturday- to help supplement the nonprofit's limited income.

Mother and daughter say the home's mission of producing self-sufficient, strong women who have goals in life is worth the price they paid to keep the homes open. Giles hears regularly from other former residents, now adults, who are leading happy, productive lives.

"Just when I'm ready to give up, one of them restores me," Giles said.

For more information, please call Giles at (805) 573-0752.