They Became Good Dads

Barbara Tinney (pictured) tells a story about passing two little boys who were singing a song popular a decade ago that mentioned fathers. ​“Then they stopped singing, and one boy asked the other, ​‘Who is your daddy?’ And there was dead silence. It broke my heart.”

And it lit a fire under her to establish a fatherhood program in New Haven. Tinney told that story to people gathered in New Haven Friday to hear about success stories and work toward making new ones.

Tinney runs the New Haven Family Alliance. It launched a Male Involvement Network that has reached out to almost 1,000 non-custodial fathers to get them involved in their kids’ lives. That effort was a focus of a workshop on fatherhood programs at the Northeast Regional Conference of the National Healthy Start Association.

She said a lot of research had already been done about the negative impact on children of absent fathers. As the lead agency, the Family Alliance pulled in other agencies —” now numbering 28 —” including New Haven Healthy Start, which believes that a nurturing relationship with a father contributes vitally to the emotional well-being of kids.

The goals of the network are to help low-income, non-custodial dads to meet the emotional, social and financial responsibilities for their children.

John Davis, Jr. is a success story. He went through the program in 2003. ​“I took various classes like parenting, job readiness. And they taught me skills to build self-esteem, and they kept me focused. It’s all about connecting,” he said. The program connected him to the Good News Garage, which provides serviceable used cars to low-income people so they can get to their jobs. ​“They connected me with Equal Opportunities, where I got certified as a lead abatement worker and a flagman; I got hired by Connecticut Traffic Control.”

That’s enabled him to pay arrears in child support for his son, who’s now 18. Davis said he was always in his son’s life, but didn’t always contribute financially.

Instead of persecuting non-custodial fathers, the program works with them to help them meet their obligations. Sherman Malone is the case management director at the Family Alliance and provides support to the Male Involvement Network.

“Fatherhood can be the most discouraging thing in the world,” she said, ​“if a man feels he can’t meet his responsibilities to his children, or, the most motivating thing in the world, because it’s a reason to live, it’s a reason to risk rejection to look for the job, to find the free events to take your child to, and to value what you can give besides money, while making sure that your children are well fed, clothed, housed.”

Tinney said that through Healthy Start, fathers in the program gained an understanding of their role before the birth of their child, at birth and in their child’s early years. She said other agencies have been helpful too. ​“Years ago, when we went to the child support court, the judge would say, ​‘If you’re not a lawyer, get out.’ We have gone from that to getting referrals from the court. Fathers used to go to jail for non-support; now we help them figure out how to support their family and stay out of jail.”

Blannie Bostic, the Male Involvement Network coordinator, came in as a client, dealing with issues of child support and visitation. He told the audience that when he was in court one day, feeling confused and miserable, a Network staffer came over to invite him to a support group the next day.

“I went to that support group,” he said, ​“where other people actually understood what it meant to be me.” He added, ​“My son is now a 15-year-old honor roll student. He’s a good kid.”

When the audience applauded, he was quick to say that much of the credit belongs to his mother. ​“The first thing we tell the guys is that we’re not here to help dads undermine the moms, but we tell them, ​‘We have your back for real, and all these agencies (part of the Network) have your back, too.”