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06/09/08 News concerning children from Eldorado

A message for our supporters:

The 3rd Court of Appeals in Austin ruled against the removal of the children from the Yearning for Zion Ranch near Eldorado, Texas by Child Protective Services. The Texas Supreme Court upheld the appeals court decision, and over 450 children were returned to their parents, including the children who stayed at our Home.

We are grateful for the outpouring of support we received for the Eldorado children. Because of you, we were able to provide for them -- as well as for our current residents -- a stable, secure, and loving home, with nurturing staff members to care for them. Your prayers, gifts, offers to volunteer, and the numerous other ways you enriched our ongoing friendship, or became a new friend, were so affirming and so appreciated!

The Eldorado children blessed and enriched our lives within the big Boys and Girls Country family -- as we grew to love them. We watched them learn about our ‘culture’, as they discovered little motorized cars, learned to ride bicycles, ate our great cooking, and they opened themselves to the possibility that not all women have to be mothers -- and some women are good people even though they have ‘bare legs’. They were sponges with the education we gave them….they asked questions galore….. and they learned much in their short time here. They are in our hearts and prayers as they leave us, and we have every confidence that they will always remember being in Hockley, Texas for 60 days.

I will share more thoughts with all of you in the summer newsletter.

Shirley A. Wright
Executive Director

In the press:

Houston Chronicle:
They drove all night from Hockley in Harris County, where Anne and Russell had been staying at the Boys and Girls Country.  Read more

The Dallas Morning News: 
[The children's parents] heaped praise on the children's caregivers, especially at Boys & Girls Country near Houston.  "They literally cried when we took them away," Ms. Young said.  Read more 

USA Today:
Shirley Wright, executive director of Boys & Girls Country in Houston, which cared for five FLDS children under age 8, says they were "typical" kids but occasionally said something startling.  Read more