CHRISTINE SABINO KIESEL

Changing children’s lives is Kiesel’s aim
Sauquoit resident hopes to help start similar programs statewide

By ROCCO LaDUCA
Observer-Dispatch
rladuca@utica.gannett.com

Though the Mohawk Valley has been a great place for Oneida County Family Court attorney referee Christine Sabino Kiesel to raise her own family, it’s been just as great of a place for her to change the lives of many more.

For every child who enters the Family Court as a victim of abuse or neglect, there is the opportunity to either make right what went wrong or to let the situation tear a family apart.

When Kiesel began a grassroots effort several years ago to help develop a Model Court program in Oneida County, she already understood the importance of keeping children in safe and loving homes. These vulnerable children and their families just needed a chance to voice their needs and concerns, whether it’s about transportation and employment troubles or child developmental delays, Kiesel said.

“There needed to be some sort of change and a better way for these children,” she said. “Cases would linger on and children would stay in foster care because there was a lack of communication. There wasn’t an effective way to have the child’s needs met.”

So Kiesel helped change the way things were done in Oneida County.
Following the example of 16 Model Courts set up nationwide in the late 1990s, the 1987 Utica Free Academy graduate and Sauquoit resident worked to establish a way for Oneida County court and social service systems to better see eye-to-eye with children and their families. With the assistance of now-retired Family Court Judge Frank Cook, Kiesel began presiding over Model Court in 2003 before it received federal funding in 2004.

“Before, parents felt that once they came to court, it was out of their control, and they had no say in what was happening to them or their children,” 37-year-old Kiesel said. “Parents now seem to be more committed to the process, and are more willing to work with the county rather than against the county.”

As Kiesel takes the next step in her career as Family Court improvement program manager for New York on Thursday, Kiesel said she hopes to help implement similar collaborative concepts across the state.

But in the Mohawk Valley, Kiesel has already made a difference for the family of Arlene, 42, and Terrence Goodman, 43, of Utica.

The Goodmans knew that if they didn’t break their drug addictions, they would never get their two children back. It’s been more than a year since both Goodmans have been drug-free and reunited with their children, but Arlene Goodman said she and her husband would not have been able to do it without Kiesel’s encouragement.

“People still can’t believe I got my kids back, and I can’t believe it sometimes either,” Goodman said. “But you can do it, and Christine was there to help me. I thought I wanted to go back and mess up, but she kept my reality focused that I can do better in life.”

Kiesel particularly kept Goodman focused on finding a job and not giving up.

“She made me remember that I am somebody and that I can’t think I’m nobody,” Goodman said. “She made me feel that I was a mother and I can still be a good mother.”

Ithaca College alumnus Kiesel graduated from Albany Law School in 1994. With eight years of Family Court experience and 11 years as an attorney, Kiesel has touched the lives of hundreds of children. She has also been a member of the Board of Directors of the Peacemaker Program, the YWCA of the Mohawk Valley, and the Oneida County Domestic Violence Coalition, and Kiesel co-owns with her husband, Bill, a locally-based company called Baby Gear To Go that rents baby furniture to traveling parents.

In her letter nominating Kiesel for the Accent on Excellence award, Peacemaker Program Executive Director Brenda Episcopo noted Kiesel’s dedication to improving the quality of life for women and children.

“She consistently goes above and beyond what is expected of her and settles for nothing less than the best for the children she is serving,” Episcopo wrote. “Christine is not afraid to take on new challenges and work hard to overcome resistance to important new projects that bring about positive change in the community.”

When a 17-year-old girl in foster care was recently worried she’d be relocated out of her school district, she got on a city bus and personally went to see what Kiesel could do to stop it. Moments like that make Kiesel realize the impact she truly has on the lives of children.
“These kids really know we’re committed to them, that we’re working for them and that they really do have a voice here,” Kiesel said.