Remnants of the last day of summer camp at the Girls Inc of Monroe County remain. A poster reading “Camp Girls Inc” in red paint greets anyone who walks in. “Pool day” is still written in dry erase marker on a whiteboard. Another sign reads, “All are welcome here.”
Tables and stacks of chairs are pushed back into corners. There are no girls running around. The only sound is of the air conditioning droning on.
No programming has occurred at Girls Inc of Monroe County since summer camp ended July 24. Since then, the building has remained empty. Employees have worked to clean up the space and pack things up.
Girls Inc of Shelbyville and Shelby County will be closing its Monroe County satellite location at the end of the month after failing to secure funds for it to operate independently.
Girls Inc, a nonprofit organization, has provided in-school programming and camps for girls for years.
Amy Dillon, president and CEO of Girls Inc of Shelbyville and Shelby County, said up until 2020, the Girls Inc location in Monroe County had been operating as an independent 501(c)(3) for nearly 50 years. Once the pandemic hit, the Monroe County location closed temporarily. Around the same time, the location lost its CEO and other key personnel members.
Dillon said the board of directors also realized they were struggling financially. Girls Inc acquires funding primarily from program service fees and community philanthropy; officials saw a decline in participation levels and revenue.
At that point, Girls Inc National reached out to Girls Inc of Shelbyville and Shelby County to complete a merger and acquisition of Girls Inc of Monroe County. The goal was to realign service delivery, form relationships with the community and become financially sustainable over the course of five years; Girls Inc of Shelbyville and Shelby County would support its Monroe County satellite location until 2026.
For the past five years, Dillon said Girls Inc of Shelbyville and Shelby County has provided $300,000 annually to the Monroe County location to keep it running; that money went toward paying staff, covering insurance, purchasing supplies and training.
Since service delivery resumed in January 2022, Olivia Sullivan, director of operations for Girls Inc of Monroe County, said hundreds of girls have participated. There were evening programs and in-school programming in Monroe, Lawrence and Greene Counties, and media literacy, mind and body and peer pressure programs.
“It's a place for girls to be themselves completely unapologetically,” Sullivan said. “It's a place for them to grow and feel safe and grow. A place for them to see themselves in other people, whether it's like role models or whatever, a place to have safe adults to talk to, make new friends, build connections, build confidence.”
Dillon said the Monroe County location couldn’t secure enough money to sustain itself. While grateful for community support, it wasn’t enough. And now, the location is forced to close. It’s open until Aug. 31.
“We went through a process where we were covering payroll and those expenses for a long time, and we have diminished our cash reserves quite significantly over the course of the last five years,” Dillon said. “And sometimes it just comes down to a math problem, and unfortunately that's the wall that we're pressed up against in Monroe County.”
As a parent who’s had her daughter in Girls Inc summer camps the past two years, Sullivan said it’s hard to accept that she’ll lose that support system. Through Girls Inc, Sullivan watched her daughter become more outgoing and confident.
“There's nothing quite like the Girls Inc experience and being surrounded by all of these other girls and girlhood and a place that's just constantly uplifting them and rooting for them,” Sullivan said. “She's losing a space where she had a bunch of people in her corner.”
‘Devastated’: Community speaks out on loss of programming
Alaina Nace’s daughter attended Girls Inc summer camps and afterschool and evening programs for the past four years. She said Girls Inc helped her daughter become more confident and gain communication skills. Girls Inc also helped support her daughter when her younger siblings were born.
“The very first spring break that my camp my daughter attended was two weeks after her baby siblings were born, and staying in the NICU,” Nace said, “and they were so great about keeping an eye on her emotional and mental wellbeing during that time, and communicating with us, and just letting that be a safe place for her.”
Nace said she feels sad that her younger daughters won’t have that same support system, especially when she and her husband are busy working.
“Having the options for having a two day fall break camp or a spring break camp were really, really important to us as working parents, and to have a place that we felt safe and comfortable and that was very communicative with us about the needs of our children,” she said.
Sherry Susnick had two girls in Girls Inc. As a single mom, she said it was “a lifesaver.” Her girls were fed snacks and got help on homework. More importantly, Girls Inc provided a safe space for her daughters where everyone was treated equally.
“Not only as a parent do you look for something to put your children in that provides a safe space, a place that's going to encourage your kids and create a safe place for them to stay, you look for a place that helps your kid grow,” she said. “Because their motto was strong, smart, and bold, and it was all females. They help them learn leadership, help them do their activities. They created friendships, diversity, confidence.”
Susnick said she’s devasted that the Monroe County location is closing. She and Nace noted what a loss the closure is for the community.
“I also feel a grief for our community that there was this really amazing and inclusive space that helped to empower girls and women and helped with community outreach of period products,” Nace said, “and losing that, I think, is going to be felt like a ripple effect that we're not really anticipating yet.”
The remaining Girls Inc locations in Indiana, including the one in Shelbyville, are open. Dillon said the Girls Inc headquarters is working on developing a program that will allow online connection for girls in remote locations. It could be launched in the next year.
While it’s unclear what the future holds, Sullivan hopes another space like Girls Inc will be available in Monroe County at some point.
“Thank you to the community and for the families that shared their girls with us over the past five years, and it's been an incredible honor for myself and the team to be able to watch these girls grow and become more confident in themselves,” Sullivan said. “My wish for them is that they continue to be strong, smart, and bold, and take the memories of Girls Inc with them forever. So, whatever they choose to do, they're all going to do amazing things.”
