CLARKSVILLE, TN (CLARKSVILLE NOW) – After two years of building efforts, Kiana’s House, a transitional home for foster youth, has opened its doors on Paradise Hill Road.
In 2021, the local nonprofit Going Global, in partnership with Mosaic Church and the City of Clarksville Neighborhood and Community Service, broke ground to create a safe place for children who are waiting for foster care placement through the Tennessee Department of Children Services.
“The light that shines the farthest, shines the brightest at home,” said Yolanda Stewart, executive pastor at Mosaic Church and director of Kiana’s House.
According to Stewart, Mosaic Church has a 20-year history of ministry and service overseas in many countries building churches, orphanages, houses, dental and health clinics and more. “The light that shines the farthest” refers to everything that Mosaic and their partners have done abroad.
“And we said, ‘It shines the brightest at home.’ We need to be intentional and develop areas where we can be precise in our focus,” Stewart told Clarksville Now. “There’s a lot of feeding programs, clothing closets, but there’s not a lot of churches lined up to be a solution and a resource to DCS.”
Originally meant to be a 1,600-square-foot facility, the build was downsized to meet commercial grade requirements. But according to Stewart, they intend on expanding, as well as building more transition homes. The home will offer a wide array of resources to foster children, including living spaces, a stocked pantry, and access to clothing and hygiene products as well as office space for DCS workers.
Clarksville Mayor Joe Pitts praised the work of Mosaic in this and other initiatives.
“If you look at most of the good happening in our city, you’ll find the fingerprints of Mosaic Church throughout; from the rapid response to the recent tornado, to the two new, affordable houses being built for two families on Richardson Street, to this magnificent home that will serve families across our city,” Pitts said in a statement. “If it’s good, it’s Mosaic,” he said.
The facility is named after the late Kiana Long, a Clarksville native and Austin Peay State University graduate who lost her fight with sickle cell anemia in 2018. Long had a passion for mentoring children, and she volunteered much of her time at Mosaic Church. Stewart said her memory will live on as Going Global works with local DCS to make a difference in the life of every child that walks through the door.
Need for juvenile resources
“The need is here,” Stewart said. “The statistics support the fact that the foster care system resources are scarce.”
Before Kiana’s House entered the vision, Mosaic Church approached DCS and asked how they could help. Stewart said DCS needed transition homes because when they remove a child from their home, it could be any time of the day or night. The child is typically taken back to the DCS office, where they sleep in cubicles while the caseworkers try to find placement.
“I coined this phrase the ‘traumatic cubicle experience,'” said Stewart. “Because while they are in that cubicle and within earshot, they are having to hear their story. A lot of those stories are horrendous, and they are having to hear their story over and over and over while the caseworker is on the phone with this place, that place, this place trying to find a placement.”
Stewart said that sometimes, these children have travel over 100 miles to another county just to have somewhere to sleep. It becomes more problematic if the children are school age and caseworkers have to travel to bring the children back to Clarksville for school.
Kiana’s House solution
DCS caseworkers and trained volunteers will staff the home and work to ensure Kiana’s House is a stable and nurturing environment for children.
“They (children) don’t have to go to a DCS office and sit in a cubicle or office all day eating trashy snacks,” Stewart said. “They get to come to a home-like environment, and it’s less traumatic when you are taken out of your home in the middle of the night with a trash bag of your personal things or maybe nothing. … And you come to a place where they are waiting for you with a warm welcome, and it’s clean – it’s beautiful!”
For more information on how you can support Kiana’s House, email kianashouse@mymosaic.ch or visit the Kiana’s House website.