'If you save just one life that's enough.' Woman devotes life to helping troubled kids

Correction: The Low-Urban Boutique is now open to the public. A previous version of this story said otherwise.

HOLLY HILL — Kenya Tumer-Griffin could have taken her management and human resources experience to just about any business and landed a well-paying position that came with mostly predictable work days and a large office overlooking flowering trees.

But that's not who Tumer-Griffin is, or ever has been.

She's pulled to positions that allow her to help those most in need, and two years ago she became the program coordinator and human resources manager for a nonprofit organization called Mr. and Ms. Mentoring, Inc.

The nonprofit helps kids between the ages of 9 and 17 who live in poverty, have a mental health diagnosis that can include everything from ADHD to autism, come from homes where they're sometimes being abused or neglected, and are at risk of drifting into an even more unstable and unhappy adulthood.

"We deal with the at-risk youth nobody else wants to deal with," Tumer-Griffin said. "They have trauma. Some have anger issues, and some have been in the court system."

It's the type of work the 48-year-old has done her entire career, and she feels she has been guided into each position she has accepted.

"I feel like whatever God chooses for me is what I have to abide by," she said. "I never make a move or career choice without taking it to God first."

With her higher power leading the way for the past few decades, she has earned two MBAs. She has served as a program manager and assistant program director for two different halfway houses and two substance abuse rehabilitation facilities.

And she was a supervisor for a juvenile diversion alternative program for kids given civil citations.

It's tough work that doesn't guarantee a happy ending, but it's what Tumer-Griffin sees herself doing for the rest of her working days.

Comprehensive help given to at-risk kids

The Mr. and Ms. Mentoring program strives to steer at-risk kids away from miserable futures. With their young lives already full of problems, they're more likely to not graduate from high school, never get a college degree, have troubled relationships, suffer low self-esteem, and abuse drugs and alcohol.

Each child in the program is assessed and given a personalized treatment plan that can include one-on-one counseling and group activities. The kids also find an outlet in art therapy, meditate in a calming room with a couch and low light when they're agitated, and work out in a gym with punching bags and free weights. They can even create songs and podcasts in a small music therapy room that has everything from a drum set to a sound room.

Services are free of charge to kids who meet the organization's criteria.

The organization is also getting ready to launch a tutoring program that will run out of the Yvonne Scarlett-Golden Cultural and Educational Center in Daytona Beach.

The nonprofit, which operates in rental space on Ridgewood Avenue in Holly Hill, also has a boutique where its clients and other impoverished community members can get nice shoes and clothing for free or at a very reduced price.

The Low-Urban Boutique, which has everything from Fendi bags to Prada shoes to jeans, protects kids from being bullied for what they're wearing. Generous donors have given Ralph Lauren clothing, high-heeled shoes, tennis shoes, men's dress shoes, boots, kids' pants, T-shirts, long-sleeved shirts, knit caps and baseball caps.

It's also a place where high school students can pick out a prom dress, and young men can get a suit and tie.

The shop is now open to the public.

"Usually people are referred to us," Tumer-Griffin said.

The nonprofit also has its own brand of clothing, which it calls Neighborhood Role Model.

'Sometimes we have to fight back tears'

Some of the kids walk into the Mr. and Ms. Mentoring facility carrying a heavy load of worries, and the program provides them a safe place to share what's weighing them down.

In the art therapy room, kids making bracelets and painting often get comfortable enough to start talking about what's bothering them, Tumer-Griffin said. There's a couch and bean bag chair where the children settle in.

"They spill their guts out when they're moving their hands. They're more forthcoming," she said.

What the caseworkers hear can be heartbreaking. Some kids are being physically abused and sexually assaulted by people who should be their fiercest protectors.

A 14-year-old girl confided one day that she had been raped by her stepfather, Tumer-Griffin said. The girl was pregnant and had the baby, but the stepfather denied the child was his.

The man was criminally charged, and his decision to plead not guilty led to the girl testifying in court and reliving her trauma. The man was convicted and sentenced to 50 years in prison.

"With the stories we hear, sometimes we have to fight back tears," Tumer-Griffin said.

A teenage boy in the program was missing school every Monday, Wednesday and Friday. When caseworkers found out he was staying home three days a week to accommodate his mother's job, the mother pulled him out of the Mr. and Ms. Mentoring program, Tumer-Griffin said.

There's also a 13-year-old girl in the program refusing to go to school, and neither the child's mother nor her school seems to be ensuring she's in class, Tumer-Griffin said.

"She's just at home playing on her phone," she said.

'She's the person who keeps it going'

The kids are taken on outings once a month, and this month they'll celebrate Christmas at Sky Zone Trampoline Park in Daytona Beach. They'll get at least an hour of jump time, and they'll be treated to a visit from Santa, presents and food all provided through sponsors of the event.

Mr. and Ms. Mentoring is mainly focused on helping kids, but the nonprofit also provides free dinners once a month to 100 people. The Sunday dinners served outside under a tent help the financially strapped families they serve, and the food is also offered to homeless people or anyone who happens to be passing by their two buildings north of Holly Hill City Hall.

The heart of the program, however, is what happens inside the aging Ridgewood Avenue buildings, where four caseworkers and other employees try to guide kids to happier, more stable lives.

Mr. and Ms. Mentoring was created in 2017 by Derrick Collins, a Bethune-Cookman University graduate.

Collins said the nonprofit's name reflects the respect he wants to show the kids he helps. The children call him Mr. Collins, but he also addresses them as Mr. or Ms.

The nonprofit stays afloat with federal grants and community donations, said Collins, the organization's CEO and director. One of the biggest supporters is Mayor Derrick Henry, who has donated around $20,000 from funds he and the city commissioners are given from the city government to distribute to local programs and causes they want to help.

Henry said Tumer-Griffin is an unsung hero.

"She's just a positive force and doesn't seek recognition," Henry said. "Clearly she has a heart for helping others."

The mayor said the Mr. and Ms. Mentoring program "is a Godsend," and exactly the type of agency he loves to see in the Daytona Beach area.

"They don't believe any kid is irredeemable," he said.

Tumer-Griffin is vital to keeping the agency running well, Collins said.

"She's the person who keeps it going," Collins said.

Lifelong devotion to helping

The two have known one another since Collins interned for Tumer-Griffin at the Volusia Halfway House. She said she was "delighted" when Collins asked her to be a part of Mr. and Ms. Mentoring. She took a $10,000 pay cut to accept the position but has no regrets.

"I felt God was leading me here," she said. "I've always been in the service field assisting people in need of help in some way."

When she was 16, Tumer-Griffin started working with kids in a parks and recreation position for the city of Daytona Beach. Now 32 years later, she's still working part-time for the city teaching dance classes.

In a career that has given her a front-row seat to those struggling with mental health issues, addiction, poverty and criminal records, she decided a few years ago that she wanted to put her energy into helping kids to try to spare them what she has witnessed in adults.

"I feel as though children are more impressionable," Tumer-Griffin said. "I want to catch them before they get into the kinds of problems adults have."

She's hoping she can get through to some of the 60 kids currently enrolled at Mr. and Ms. Mentoring, but she knows there will be disappointments.

"You put your all into these kids, and then they get into a fight or break into a car," she said. "They self-sabotage. They're used to chaos and drama."

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But there are success stories. Tumer-Griffin told the story of a teenage girl who was bounced from house to house because of her anger issues after her father died.

In one house, she was neglected, abused and then kicked out. Now she's in a transitional housing program that offers various types of support and she's thriving. She went to the homecoming dance this year, she's working and she's on track to graduate high school.

"It's amazing how people count these kids out," Tumer-Griffin said. "Just a little patience can make the difference."

She said she knows she "can't save all of them." But that won't stop her from trying to help as many kids as she can.

"If you save just one life," she said, "that's enough."

You can reach Eileen at Eileen.Zaffiro@news-jrnl.com

This article originally appeared on The Daytona Beach News-Journal: Volusia County woman helps troubled kids others have given up on