Meet the Staff
EXECUTIVE DIRECTOR: Joanne Whalen
Joanne has served since 1998 as the Executive Director of LifeCare Center East (LCCE), where she oversees all aspects of the center's operations, ensuring that the mission is carried out with compassion and respect for each individual served. She is a recent recipient of the Sister Jeanne Therese Condon award from Total LifeCare Centers in recognition of her outstanding service.
NURSE MANAGER:
CLIENT SERVICES COORDINATOR
CLIENT SERVICES ADVOCATE
Our many generous volunteers help as counselors, ultrasound services, Hispanic and Hmong interpreters, office administrative assistants and webmaster, computer technology, newsletter coordinator, baby layette and clothes, maintenance and more.
Our Mission
To provide life affirming choices, compassionate assistance and educational support that meets the needs of abortion-vulnerable women, and their families, who are experiencing a possible crisis pregnancy; and to inform the community it serves about life saving approaches to preventing unwanted pregnancies.
Our History
LCCE is a non-profit pregnancy resource center founded in 1989 to serve the east metro area and is one of 26 centers in the Total LifeCare Centers, Inc. system of pregnancy resource centers serving the metro area as well as greater Minnesota and Wisconsin.
Total LifeCare Centers, Inc. defines itself as a “non-profit organization dedicated to the philosophy that every individual has the right to adequate health care, covering all physical, emotional, and social needs, from conception to natural death.”
We have helped thousands of women, men, and babies on the east side of St. Paul since our opening and have served clients from numerous ethnic and cultural backgrounds with the help of our committed staff, volunteers and generous supporters.
2009 marks our 20th anniversary. In 2008 alone, LCCE had over 3100 client visits for social services, material goods and/or education. That year our center performed 750 pregnancy tests, 250 ultrasound exams and gave out nearly 20,000 diapers. The number of client visits and needs continue to grow.
All of our services are, and always have been, offered free of charge.
Board of Directors
President
- Tom Smolik, Retired Electrician
Vice President
- Stephanie Witzel, Homemaker and Graphic Designer
Treasurer
- Kathy Dailey, Retired Parish Business Administrator
Secretary
- Paul Esch, President of Breakthrough Business Success, Inc.
Board Members
- Mary Hite
- John Roche, Consulting Research Engineer and Founder of LCCE
- Mary Roche, Homemaker and Founder of LCCE
MEDICAL DIRECTOR
SPECIAL ADVISORS AND TOTAL LIFECARE CENTERS, INC. BOARD LIAISON
- John Hagen, Jr., Attorney at Law
