IV Life Center pursues its pro-life mission compassionately
EL CENTRO — One of Imperial Valley’s most polarizing controversies in recent years has never really gone away, but it has settled into a kind of détente. Think North and South Korea without the barbed wire and land mines.
But there is a fence, and there are definitely opposing sides.
It’s been more than three years since the Imperial Valley Coalition for Life went toe to toe with the city and Planned Parenthood over plans to introduce abortion services at the Imperial Valley Health Center at 1463 S. Fourth St.
The coalition, a prolife consortium of various churches, businesses and private citizens, lost the battle, but they continued fighting the war, although not necessarily with the momentum they originally anticipated.
Soon after the city approved the final permitting that allowed the women’s clinic to perform abortions, leaders of the Imperial Valley Coalition for Life began making plans to open a pro-life women’s center right next door.
The idea was to create an educational center that might draw prospective mothers to explore alternatives to abortion as well as provide them assistance during and after pregnancy. The assistance would include counseling, parenting classes and supplies such as diapers and formula. The center would also have a sonogram machine to enable women to see their babies in the womb before making a decision to terminate pregnancy.
The lot was available; a modular building was found to put on it, and plenty of people were on board. The prevailing hope was that the new Imperial Valley Life Center could open by the end of 2015.
And then time passed … and passed, until the center finally was able to open its doors in November 2017. But the anticipated centerpiece of the operation — a sonogram unit — was still missing.
Not anymore. A brand new sonogram machine was installed at the center, located at 1561 S. Fourth St., Ste. B, earlier this month, and an open house was held Sept. 15 to celebrate its arrival and to share diapers, formula, wipes and other baby items with new and expectant mothers.
Imperial Valley Life Center Director Betty Predmore acknowledged the process took considerably longer than she and others had hoped. But rules are rules, and there was no getting around them for the sake of expediency.
“There are a lot of requirements you have to meet in terms of the permitting process and those kinds of things that go with setting up a building on bare land,” she explained. “And then you have getting the funding for those things, and all that. It just took time — a lot of time and patience.”
Emotions ran hot locally when it became clear Planned Parenthood intended to open an abortion clinic, Predmore recalled. “Everybody was there at the rallies, and they were there at the council meetings, and everybody was, you know, really ready for this new center,” she said. “I’m that way, too. When I want something, I want to see the result, like tomorrow. And that’s just not the way it works.”
The IV Life Center also is home to W.O.V.E.N., a local women’s ministry for which Predmore also serves as director. It was that organization that served as the focal point for most of the activities at the center until the sonogram machine arrived.
Predmore said she is hopeful the sonogram unit, which cost about $26,000, will be a game-changer. “It’s time to go out and say, ‘OK, now we’re in the life-saving business.’”
In a perfect world, Predmore would like to persuade every pregnant woman not to choose abortion. “But, in reality, that’s not going to happen,” she said. “You know there are some who are dead set on it, and they don’t want to hear any other alternative. They’ve made their minds up. But for anyone who’s uncertain and anyone who is just doing it out of a sense of helplessness or despair, anyone we could reach in any way, if we can pull those in and save those babies, that’s doing our job.”
The relationship — using that term in its loosest sense — between Planned Parenthood and the neighboring pro-life center might best be described as wary. A solid fence stands between the two parking lots with a gap wide enough to allow through traffic. The buildings are close enough that two people could make eye contact with one another standing at the front door of each. Security guards patrol the Planned Parenthood premises to protect against trespassers, and they quickly shoo away any unauthorized users of their parking lot.
“They are very fair about that,” Predmore said of the security guards. “They don’t want us parking any of our clients parking over in their lot. … But at the same time, if one of their clients pulls into our lot, the security guards will ask them to move.”
Predmore said she’s never had anyone from the Planned Parenthood side say anything negative or threatening to her, and she fully intends to keep things civil from her side of the fence.
“Having a nasty comment about them is not going to help our cause,” she said. “What’s going to help our cause is to have compassion and understanding for women and to just fight our little fight over here on our side of the street and concentrate on getting a hold of every woman that we can.”