The Harbor Hosts Family Day in Overton Park

By LAURA ROBISON

The Progress

A Family Field Day event hosted by The Harbor was held at the Overton Park last Saturday, May 13.
The Harbor is a program that does youth assessments to connect people and families with the social services they need.

Judy Metz, a community services specialist with Clark County helped coordinate the event. “It’s hard for people to come out from Vegas and put the pieces together to help people and hold events,” Metz said. “The Harbor comes out every other Saturday. But we didn’t think many would go to the community center. So we decided a family event at the park would be a better way to connect with the residents in Moapa Valley.”

Stephania Saldana is the program manager for the Moapa rural mobile program. She explained that The Harbor does free assessments for youth ages 17 and under. They have space to work in all four of the schools and at the Overton Community Center.

“What we do is connect familes to resources such as mental health classes, counseling, food and clothing shortages, parenting classes, substance abuse services, juvenile probation resources, and even recreation activities,” Saldana said. “I believe in helping communities and meeting people where they are, not where you want them to be.”

Saldana said her office receives phone calls from schools or parents who prefer face to face meetings instead of phone calls or Zoom. Covid has affected a lot of people and most of them want a one-on-one in person visit to help them.

At the family day, there were plenty of activities to do, including corn hole, tug of war, sack races, ring toss, water balloon toss, bubble station and more. Prizes were given out after the games, such as toys, board games, coloring books and a skate board.

Hamburgers and hot dogs were served by Judy Metz with help from youth volunteers from the 4-H Teen Leadership Corps.

This was all done in an informal setting so The Harbor representatives could get to know the families in Moapa Valley and talk about what is avaible to them. “We bring the services here and there is never a cost to the family for anything we do or provide,” said Saldana.

For more information about The Harbor please visit https://theharborlv.com/ or call 702-455-7914 to make an appointment.