Adam Torres and Steve Gunther discuss Mega Mix Expo.
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Show Notes:
Listen to Mega Mix Expo coverage. In this episode, Adam Torres interviews Steve Gunther, President & CEO at Maryvale, explore the upcoming Megamix expo
About Steve Gunther
Steve Gunther joined Maryvale in 2009, having served in several leadership positions at various non-profit organizations. Steve was the Chief Operating Officer at St. Anne’s, a social service agency serving at-risk pregnant women, mothers, and children for five years. Prior to that position, Steve was the Program Operations Manager at Girls and Boys Town of Southern California. Dedicated to giving vulnerable young people the best possible chance for a bright future, Steve has worked directly with children and youth—as a high school teacher, social worker, and administrator—since 1984.
Steve holds a Masters of Arts in Management from the Claremont Graduate University, Peter F. Drucker Graduate School of Management; a Masters of Social Work (MSW) from the University of Southern California; and a Bachelor of Arts in Psychology with a minor in Theology from Loyola Marymount University. Steve is a Licensed Clinical Social Worker in the State of California. He is also on the Board of Directors of The Association of Community Human Services Agencies (ACHSA).
About Maryvale
Maryvale is Los Angeles’ oldest children’s charity and one of San Gabriel Valley’s most trusted and longest-running providers of child and family services for the underserved. We have been committed to serving the needs of children and families since 1856. We provide early education and after-school programming, mental health and wrap-around services, community education, short-term transitional housing for various populations in need, and will soon offer outpatient substance abuse treatment for children and teens. Regardless of adversity, beliefs, or background, Maryvale is dedicated to serving all in need, providing each child or family with hope and a chance to attain a more fulfilling life.
Full Unedited Transcript
Hey, I’d like to welcome you to another episode of Mission Matters. My name is Adam Torres, and if you’d like to apply to be a guest in the show, just head on over to missionmatters. com and click on Be Our Guest to Apply. All right, so today I have Steve Gunther on the line, and he is the President and CEO over at Maryvale.
Steve? Welcome to the show. Well, good morning. Happy to be here. All right. So I understand that you’re going to be participating in the Megamix Expo. That’s going to be happening on March 12th and 13th. For those that have been watching this series for a long time that, you know, I’ve been talking about this expo and we definitely want , everybody to come out there and check it out.
So you can go to megamixexpo. com to get tickets. And if there’s still. Some booths available, I believe. So if you want to be a sponsor and have a booth and have, you know, have your services and products in front of a lot of people I’ll be there and I’ll be doing some live podcasting as well and doing some interviews to definitely come out and check us out.
So Steve circling back to the expo, I just want to make sure , I’m off and not off on this. So you’re going to have a booth there or a table, and you’re going to have some people out there as well. So people can come out and learn about Maryvale, right? Correct. Yeah, we participated last year and it was a wonderful experience and there’s such a wide variety of, of folks there who have information about their, you know, their businesses and so forth.
And lots of folks walking around asking questions. So we’re excited to be back again this year. That’s awesome. Okay. So you’re a veteran then this is my first year coming and I’m pretty excited. What, brings you back? Like, tell me about the vibe and like why you’re coming back.
A lot of things you could do, but I like talking to a veteran. Cause again, it’s my first year. Yes, you know, so, so for Maryville, you know, Maryville next year we’ll be celebrating 170 years as an organization. We were originally, you know, founded in 1856, but a lot of folks don’t know who we are.
And we’ve had some significant transitions in our programs in the last few years. And so we’re taking, you know, whatever opportunities we can to be in the community educating folks, making folks aware of Maryvale and our programs and our services. And so we saw the mega mix last year and decided, let’s go, let’s try it out.
And just a large numbers of folks from across the valley. And just varied backgrounds and it was just a great opportunity. We thought to introduce folks to Who we are and what we do and we had some wonderful conversations made some great contacts And so we’re definitely looking forward to being back.
Yeah Tell us a little bit more about Marybelle. Talk to a little bit more about the organization. You said a hundred and how many did you say? A hundred and seventy something years? Well, currently it’s a hundred and sixty nine. Sixty nine, wow, okay. Yeah, January, you know, January it’ll be a hundred and seventy.
Wow. So we’re already talking about, you know, how we’re going to celebrate that. But yeah, so the Daughters of Charity are the founders and sponsors of the agency. They Five of the sisters arrived in 1856 and started the work. A matter of fact, they started working out of a home that was located where union station sits today, downtown.
Wow. And so they started that work. I live downtown, by the way. So I’m in that area all the time. So I know exactly where you’re talking about. That’s amazing. Go ahead, please. That’s awesome. Yeah. So they were, they were right in the heart of the, you know, those early days of. Even before the city was incorporated and their work eventually became two things Maryvale, what we know as Maryvale today, but they also started the first hospital in Los Angeles, which became the St.
Vincent’s Medical Center, which was downtown for, you know, many, many, many years. So they had, you know, quite a presence and an influence in those early days of the, of the city eventually they moved to Boyle Heights and then in 1953 they moved to what is today Rosemead and and changed the name to Maryvale.
So throughout our history, they, you know, they, they arrived at the invitation of Bishop Almonte because there were children that were being abandoned on the streets. And so they came out to start providing shelter and care, you know, housing for them and have continued that work and working with children and families ever since.
And so. Today we have three early education centers one in Rosemead, one in Duarte, and one in South El Monte where we provide early education for kids from birth through up to kindergarten. We have community based mental health. Programs. And we also in the last couple of years have started a temporary housing program for single moms with small Children.
So we’re and that was in house. Am I right? That one? Yes, that one. That one is called Seaton house. And that really resulted from a big transition for us in 2020, we made a decision to close our then residential treatment program that really had its roots back to the original orphanage and in those latter years, you know, we had been serving children placed mainly girls, but some, you know, boys that were placed through the Department of Children, Family Services and probation.
But, yeah. The state of California started putting in place some reforms and that had some dramatic impact on programs like ours. And so we ultimately made the decision that it was time to close that program. And so we did that and it was, it was, it was a big deal. We ended up having to let go of 150 staff.
We had three buildings on campus that were vacant that had housed that program. So it was a, a huge transition. And then unfortunately that was also happening in 2020 during the pandemic and it had nothing to do with the pandemic, but it was a, a major transition for us. But. You know, we took that as an opportunity to really step back and look at, you know, where we’d been and where we were and where we were going and put in place a new strategic plan for the next three years.
And as a result of that, we eventually made the decision to open this housing program. And so we have one building on campus currently where we can have nine moms with their children and we have a large. Dorm on campus that we recently got approval through the city of Rosemead. And we’re going to begin soon.
We hope the interior renovations to create 20 more individual living units in that building. So we’ll be able to eventually housed up to 29 families on the campus. So we’re excited about that and we’re slowly moving forward in that process. , how long have you been in Maryvale?
16 years. I arrived in February of 2009. Amazing. And what, what drew you originally to like the mission and just to, you know, a lot of things you can do, like what drew you there? And , I’m happy to hear you’ve been there for a bit. And, and what drew you there originally? I’m curious. Well, so , going back a bit, I started out originally as a high school teacher and I did that for about three years.
Decided that I loved working with the kids but I didn’t so much care for the day to day teaching, you know lesson planning, grading papers, all that stuff. So I went back to school and got my master’s in social work. And I’d started to shift into social work and working in residential programs with kids.
And, you know, over time I took on new roles. I worked with the St. Ann’s in Los Angeles. I worked with Boys Town here in Los Angeles. And the opportunity came along here at Maryvale. And it I happen to be. Catholic and have, you know, worked pretty much in Catholic agencies and Catholic organizations.
And so that was important. And it was just a wonderful organization doing good work. And I was excited to have the opportunity to come. And so I said, yes, and I’ve been here ever since. Yeah. What do you attribute some of , the reason I’ll tell you where this question’s coming from.
A lot of people listen to this show and you know, there’s a lot of different ways to give back. There’s a lot of different people to get involved and there’s, you know, and this is a, you know, a hundred and going on 170 year old organization. You’ve been, you know, you’re in the DNA of it at this point.
You’ve been there long enough. You’ve seen, yeah. What works, you’ve seen what doesn’t what do you think has made this so successful like through the years to, give it like long lasting power to continue to serve and help in the community? Like what could people learn from that as they go out into their world, whether it’s with their own nonprofits or otherwise, like , to make a difference.
So you know, I think one of the things that. It has impressed me about Maryvale and certainly my time here and as I, shared, you know, we went through a major transition , and have, you know, come out on the other side doing new and exciting things. I think, you know, the daughters of charity, the organization has been able to, you know, adapt to whatever the needs are in the community.
So another good example was the daughters started the, one of the first, or their first early education program here on the Rosemead campus in 1968. You know, that was, you know, long before that, was, the kinds of programs and services you see today, you know, extent that’s ground groundbreaking at that point in the sixties, like, yeah.
Right. And you know, the daughters recognized two things. One, they had, they were, at that time they were. They were serving kids here on the campus in their program that were younger but they also recognized that there were, you know, single family or working families in the community that needed support as well.
And so they opened, you know, that program here on the campus. And as I said, eventually opened another one or took over one in Duarte and then. You know, opened one recently in South Omani. So it’s that, ability to recognize the need and to adapt to serving that need in whatever way we can.
And again, the Seaton House program is another example of that, right? We had to kind of move in a new direction and we had to look at the facilities, you know, this beautiful 13 acre campus here in Rosemead and South Omani. You know, how are we going to use, use the resources that we have to serve the community?
And, and then, you know, the need is there and, and we have been, you know, in a small way trying to, to meet that need and help these young moms and their families to take steps towards a better future. Can you talk about how education plays a role, like in the overall, let’s just say Maryvale platform and just ecosystem, like how does education, whether it’s for the, you know, the young mothers, whether it’s for the kids, like how does that play a role in it?
You know, it’s such an important part of what we try to do, you know, and, and so, you know, I’ve had people over the years, you know, because, you know, we were running a, you know, we had a group home residential program and then, and they would ask, well, you know, you’re, you do early education. What is that all about?
And, you know, we really see it as, as not only providing that foundation, you know, for early learning and a, and a foundation for educational success, but we really see it also as prevention and early intervention. Okay. You know, the opportunity to, to, you know, support young families, you know, early in their, in their, their family life and the lives of their children and, you know, to be able to provide, resources and support if, you know, challenges come up, whether it’s an educational challenge or an emotional challenge or even a, physical health challenge.
So, you know, being in a position and having relationships with the families that allow us to. To provide that kind of support and direction for them as if they needed beyond, you know, providing a quality educational experience and, for the moms, for example, it’s a short term program.
You know, we’re focusing on moms being here for 6 months, right? It’s to really stabilize them and get them on a solid footing. And their education is a big part of that. So helping moms to, really look at what their goals are and what that path is. going forward and then trying to get them on that path.
And so for some of them, it’s completing a GED for others. It’s, you know, we’ve had moms who have, you know, completed like certified nursing assistance programs or, other programs. We have moms in the housing program that have actually been hired as teachers assistants in our early education program, right?
So. You know, you know, trying to meet them where they’re at and give them that opportunity to take steps forward and to, you know, to be successful and move towards, you know, permanent long term housing and educational success and employment and and all those things. So, so education is critical for all of that. so Steve, we’re in, you know, Feb for everybody listening, where it’s February 2025 and what, what’s your vision for, you know, the rest of the year and going forward? Like, what, what kind of things are you working on? Just we’re dreamers here too. Like a lot of, of business owners, entrepreneurs.
I know you’re, in the middle of your planning and execution, like everyone else. What’s the vision for the rest of 2025? 25. So our, , , as I said, our big focus is to get this renovation up and going and, , you know, once we get the final permits, which we’re pretty close to getting that all in place, we’re looking about eight or nine months of, of construction.
So, you know, a big focus for us is getting that, Renovation completed so that we could then, grow that seat in house program and serve more families. In the meantime, we’re always looking at opportunities to expand our other programs. We’d like to grow our early education program and serve more kids and families in that program as well as we were working to expand our community mental health.
And we’ve recently last year or so. launched a new program called Connections by Maryvale, which is a mental health and substance use program for, for adolescents. And that is quickly getting you know, traction and growing and we’re, you know, able to provide substance use education through a collaboration with Azusa Pacific University doing.
You know, some other work in that area. So, you know, we’re really looking just to, grow and expand, you know, the services that we have and, and really to serve as many people as we can. So, you know, , our goal is to, expand and serve more folks. Wonderful. If people are listening to this and they want to get involved and with Maryvale or learn more, how do they do that?
So the easiest thing to do would be to go to our website, which is Maryvale.org, M A R Y V A L E. org, and all the information about our programs and services and how to, you know, support us or get connected with us is there. They can also find us on Facebook, Instagram, LinkedIn, so we’re, you know, on all of those social media sites as well, so.
Fantastic. And for everybody listening, just so you know, we’ll definitely put the links in the show notes so you can just click on the links and head right on over and check out Maryvale. And speaking of the audience, if this is your first time here and you haven’t done it, you hit that subscribe or follow button.
This is a daily show. Each and every day we’re bringing you new content, new contacts, and hopefully new inspiration to help you along the way on your journey as Well went through the power of story. So definitely hit that subscribe and follow button. And don’t forget mega mix expo, March 12th and 13th.
We will be out there on site. Come, come by, check out Maryvale booth. I’ll have a booth too, and I’ll be doing some live podcasts. And so come check us both out and Steve, thanks again so much. And looking forward to seeing the team at the, at the expo. Thanks for, thanks for coming on the show. Great.
Adam, thank you so much.