By Jay Meisel

Staff writer

TREASURE COAST - At 18, a young woman who had lived in a foster home was forced to live on her own. Unhappy with her minimum wage job, she turned to drugs and ended up in jail.

But because of support from a counselor with Children's Home Society, Christina Bury, who is now 22, attends classes at Indian River State College.

"It has helped me stay off the streets," Ms. Bury said last week. "If I didn't have this program, I wouldn't be at this table (for an interview)."

To help more young adults like Ms. Bury, as they age out of the foster system, Children's Home Society will break ground Nov. 16 on a Youth Transition Center. The groundbreaking will be held from 1:30 to 3:30 p.m. at 650 10th St. in Vero Beach. The facility will cost $5 million, of which the Children's Home Society has raised almost $3 million. While conducting a campaign to garner the rest, the society hopes to open the center in a year.

It will serve foster children in Indian River, St. Lucie, Martin and Okeechobee counties.

Currently, the society provides counseling and help to foster children.

Even with that assistance, 50 percent of foster children end up homeless and unemployed without a high school diploma after they reach 18, Lawrence Brooks, executive director of Children's Home Society, said.

By building the transition center, Children's Home Society hopes to prevent more foster children from ending up in bleak situations, Mr. Brooks said.

The residential center will have nine apartments that will serve up to 20 youth.

While there, Mr. Brooks said, they will be taught life skills and receive assistance with plans to go to school or work.

They will only stay there a limited amount of time, he said.

"If we create a system where they become dependent on us, we have failed," Mr. Brooks said.

Foster teens are in a much different situation when they reach 18, than their counterparts, who live their natural families, he said.

While some non-foster teens continue to live with their parents or at least receive some help in most cases, the teens must leave their foster homes, he said.

And even if they could remain with their foster parents, most want a less restrictive environment when they reach 18, he said.

Some are eligible for some state assistance for tuition and living expenses, but it is limited. Often, they don't take advantage of that, he said.

"What we are in effect saying to these young people when they turn 18 is 'happy birthday, you're homeless,'" Mr. Brooks said. "The Youth Transition Center will give them the opportunity to make a positive transition into adulthood and become contributing members of society."

For Ms. Bury, staying in her foster home was not an option. Her foster mother was a good person and made her get her GED, she said.

"She made me do everything," she said. "I didn't do it for myself."

While she was in jail, she said, her foster mother moved to Texas.

She ended up working in a sewing factory.

"I didn't want to make $6 an hour for the rest of my life," Ms. Bury said.

She hopes attending college will open up better opportunities.

Sancia Jeantil, 20, also a former foster child, is attending Indian River State College and wants to become a probation officer.

Without help from the Children's Home Society and state assistance, she said, she would have less hope of that goal becoming true.

Ms. Jeantil, whose family came to Florida from Haiti, said she was placed in a group home and then a regular foster home because of issues in her family.

Children's Home Society was able to help her get a green card to stay in the United States and attend college.