Mitza Molina strolled into the Kino Community Teen Center at East Ajo Way on a warm April afternoon for a routine check-up. The Desert View High School grad and current University of Arizona student has received primary care at the south side clinic since she was 16, even though she has no health insurance.
"I feel comfortable coming here without my parents," says Molina, 19, who like many teenage girls, was uncomfortable asking her parents for birth control. "Some parents would just kill their kids if they found out they were having sex."
Molina considers herself lucky to have the resources of the Teen Center available to her in a state where, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention's 2006 National Vital Statistics Report, teenage pregnancy rates rank 48th out of 50 states and every 89 of 1,000 girls between 15 and 19 become pregnant.
"It's a place where teens can come and feel safe," she says. "It's a place where they can take precautionary steps like birth control."
The Teen Center opened in 1997 and offers people 21 and under primary health care for everything from sore throats and stomach aches to school sports physicals and immunizations.
The clinic also offers confidential STD and pregnancy testing and birth control, all on a sliding fee scale.
But Diane Kerrihard, the center's program coordinator, says that come June 30, the center may no longer exist.
Pima County is looking into closing the site as a clinic and housing other services at the county-owned building. Hank Atha, deputy county administrator for community and economic development, says it doesn't really matter where the center is held because a lot of the services are education based and go out into high schools and communities.But for those who work at or use the Teen Center, it really does matter where the center is held.
Dr. Richard Wahl, a UA clinical pediatrics professor, provides primary care at the Teen Center three half-days a week.
"The center is a lot more than this clinic," Wahl says. "It is a full-service primary care adolescent site."
The center offers pre- and post-natal classes, and everything from breastfeeding classes to how to properly install a car seat is free.
Delia Franceware, the centers mobile outreach coordinator, says nobody is turned away from the clinic regardless of their ability to pay. "
If you can make a payment, fine. If not, we are donation based," she says.
Kerrihard says not all services will be lost if the center closes. She and her staff will move to other Pima County Health facilities.
Family planning for teens will also be available at Pima County Health Department sites throughout the city. Wahl says, he believes it will be shut and plans to leave after June 30 anyway. He says the Teen Center is "crucial" for the community since it is a major clinical site for South Tucson and parts of Vail.
"Many low-income kids do not have other alternatives, do not have resources," he says. "It needs to be community-based care, and if you remove care from the community that is most at risk, you will have serious consequences."
A petition is currently making its way through south side high schools pleading with the county manager and the health department to keep the center open. Kerrihard and the rest of the staff, however, are preparing for the worst. Until then, the center will remain open.
