A Home for Families: Inside the

On a September morning in Waterville, the ribbon will be cut, the doors will swing open, and a community will finally see what more than a century of care has been building toward. The Maine Children's Home Center for Families opens its doors to the public on Wednesday, September 16, 2026, with remarks from center leadership and tours of the newly renovated 7,600-square-foot Lunder Building at 93 Silver Street. But the story of this moment did not begin with the renovation, nor even with the $525,000 in federal funding that made it possible. It began in 1899, when a group of Mainers opened the Kennebec Valley Home for Children as a temporary refuge for kids whose families were in crisis. What started as an orphanage has evolved into something far more ambitious: a nonprofit that touches the lives of nearly 3,000 Mainers every year through adoption, mental health counseling, young parent support, and targeted case management. The Center for Families finally brings those four programs together under one roof, and the result is more than a building. It is a statement about how care should work. For decades, the organization's programs operated in separate buildings on its Waterville campus. A young mother might come for parenting education in one place, then drive across town for counseling in another. A family navigating adoption might find themselves shuffling between offices, repeating their story to a new intake worker each time. The Center for Families was designed to end that fragmentation. By housing adoption, counseling, young parent support, and targeted case management in a single facility, the center allows program directors and clinicians to collaborate in real time, often in hallway conversations that would never have happened across town. Executive Director Dan Booth has a favorite example from the center's first days of serving clients. A young mom arrived for a parenting education program, and in an unplanned moment, a program director and a clinician realized a counselor had immediate availability. Within minutes, the mother was connected to mental health support. 'That kind of coordination is what the center is for,' Booth said. It is the kind of story that makes the grand opening feel less like a ribbon-cutting and more like a homecoming. The building itself has its own history. The Lunder Building is roughly 60 years old, and its recent renovation was supported in part by $525,000 in congressionally directed funds requested and secured by Sen. Angus King, approved in 2023. The modernization included trauma-informed design touches, a reflection of the organization's deepening understanding of the people it serves. A separate grant from the Bangor Savings Bank Foundation is supporting the creation of a healing garden for clients, part of a broader effort to make the center feel welcoming rather than institutional. Those details matter to an organization whose roots run deep in Waterville. The Maine Children's Home was founded in 1899 as the Kennebec Valley Home for Children, a temporary refuge for children whose families faced difficult times. In 1915, the organization made a pivotal decision: it closed its orphanage. Rather than housing children, it would focus on finding them adoptive families. That shift set the tone for the next century of evolution, as the organization repeatedly reinvented itself to meet the changing needs of Maine families. In 1974, it launched what is now known as the Journey Program, a young parent support program that began as the Sharon Abrams Teen Parent School Program, an alternative high school for pregnant and parenting teens. Today, the Journey Program helps young parents work toward academic, financial, and personal success, offering prenatal and parenting instruction, life skills development, and individualized guidance. It has been life-changing for generations of participants. Allison Grady, who graduated from the program in 2017, put it plainly: 'Without Journey Program, my life would have taken a completely different path. I owe my high school diploma, subsequent opportunities, and even my friendships to the program.' The Journey Program remains a cornerstone of the Center for Families, and its presence under the new roof is fitting, given that the organization's work with teen parents is where its modern programming began. The timing of the grand opening is significant in another way. It comes as demand for mental health counseling in Maine is surging. Booth acknowledged that the organization's counseling staff had dwindled over the past two years, and the new center is designed to help rehire clinicians and improve access to care. The need is acute across the state, and the center's coordinated model is meant to help families navigate what can otherwise be an overwhelming web of systems and referrals. 'For many families, navigating multiple systems can be overwhelming,' Booth said. 'The Center for Families allows our teams to work more closely together so support feels connected, responsive and centered around the needs of each individual and family.' The grand opening on September 16 runs from 10 to 11 a.m., with an opening ceremony featuring remarks from center leadership, followed by tours of the facility. It is free and open to the public, an invitation for the community to see firsthand where their support has led. For a nonprofit that has spent 127 years adapting to the needs of Maine's children and families, the Center for Families represents a new chapter, one that brings together the lessons of the past and the promise of the future. The doors are opening, the programs are under one roof, and the hallway conversations have already begun.