(L-R) Executive Director Donna Sandage and Brenda Norris, who will be in the Jasper office.

Pregnancy Care Center Executive Director Donna Sandage is excited about the addition of a new office in Jasper that will be opening on Tuesday, Feb. 3, which will add to the current Lake City and Live Oak network of Pregnancy Care Centers. The center will be located inside the First Federal Bank building in downtown Jasper at 507 Hatley St. West. 

“It’s going to be beautiful,” Sandage said. “It’s brand new and never been used. We’ll be the first one.”

To start, they will be open two days a week on Tuesdays and Wednesdays from 10 a.m. until 4 p.m. The date for the official ribbon cutting and open house will be announced soon. Local resident Brenda Norris, who also heads up Operation At Home, will be serving as head counselor in the Jasper office.

“We are a pro life, non-profit organization and we want to help moms and dads with unplanned pregnancies to take care of their baby, parent their baby and save the life of that baby,” said Sandage.

The Live Oak center, Sandage said, was established in 2001 and the office in Lake City has been around for 30 years, since 1985. The centers offer two phases of care. The first is pregnancy tests, counseling and ultrasounds, and the second phase entails parenting and resources. Currently, Live Oak and Lake City are offering ultrasounds, but until more funding is received there won’t be any ultrasounds done in the Jasper office. Sandage is hopeful it won’t be too far off in the future. All of the sonographers, Sandage said, are retired RN’s who volunteer their time.

“A lot of babies are saved right here, as they see that heartbeat the first time,” said Sandage of the sonogram room.

Sandage recently offered a tour of the two-story Live Oak office where Vickie Hicks serves as center director, and the site is quite impressive. They offer numerous programs for both mothers and daddies in a Christian setting.

“We have a program called ‘Earn While You Learn’,” said Sandage. “Moms come in, take a parenting class, and for that they earn Mommy Money and Daddy Dollars, which is fake money that they can only spend here. They use that to buy resources for their baby.”

Sandage said they want their clients to be great parents and change the course of parenthood.

“We want to make everybody a great parent,” she said. “They have time and we have resources, and we bridge it with parenting classes, so it is pretty awesome. They give, but they get, and we get to pour into them good things for their baby.”

Inside the center, beyond the waiting room, is a diaper room and also a maternity room.

“We have maternity clothes and they don’t have to pay for the clothes at all,” Sandage said. “They just bring them back when they’re through with them.”

Inside the maternity room there are also baby books that can be checked out, as well as nursing pads, baby food and lotions.

“This is the mommy stuff,” said Sandage.

In the adjacent room is Cathy’s Closet, which immediately brings out the ooh’s and ahh’s when one sees all the cute, little baby clothes hanging on the racks.

“This is where they shop,” said Sandage. “All of our resources come from people that love what we do.”

Because the organization is faith-based, they do not receive any government funding, Sandage explained.

“We depend on the churches and the community and they have given us every bit of this,” Sandage said, as she pointed around Cathy’s Closet.

There are clothes for boys and girls, and Sandage said the moms don’t have to buy clothes for their baby if they don’t want to.

“They just put into the program and they can have everything their baby needs,” she said. “If we have it, they can have it, if they put the time in.”

There is another room filled with accessories, such as cribs and car seats, and other baby essentials that clients can purchase.

Sandage said the volunteer counselors are doing a wonderful job forming relationships with their clients, who get a free mentor they can depend on. Sid Ballou is one of the counselors in the Live Oak office and he also serves as president of the board of directors.

“We’re a confidential organization” Sandage said. “So, none of it goes out of here. Our clients can really just come in here and talk to us and know that they have a friend.”