KC Crisis Pregnancy Centers: The New Abortion Front Line in Kansas City
KC crisis pregnancy centers gain support after Roe v. Wade. These organizations represent the new abortion ‘front line’ in a corner of Johnson County, where the two driveways are side by side on a curvy stretch of 109th Street in Overland Park. One leads into the parking lot of Planned Parenthood, where, among other things, women can receive abortion services. The other belongs to Advice & Aid Pregnancy Centers, a nonprofit crisis pregnancy center where the mission, steeped in Christian faith, is to talk women away from abortion.
The Physical Proximity and Mission
Advice & Aid Pregnancy Center, 10901 Granada Lane, Suite 100 in Overland Park, offers services for those dealing with an unplanned pregnancy, but not abortions. It is across a parking lot from Planned Parenthood, a health clinic and abortion provider. Every now and then someone trying to get to Planned Parenthood accidentally turns into the wrong driveway and winds up in the lobby of Advice & Aid. That’s what brought nearly 100 walk-ins through the door in 2020. Advice & Aid’s executive director, Ruth Tisdale, muses that “when you drive down 109th St. and turn into our driveway it is easy to see why women often ‘accidentally’ end up at our office.”
Funding and Legislative Support
Taxpayer funding of centers nationwide has escalated fivefold over the last decade, thanks to efforts of legislators in mostly Republican-led states. States are supporting the work of anti-abortion centers at the same time they’re banning or limiting abortion. Missouri already led all but two states in providing tax dollars to such centers — nearly $45 million since 2010. In Kansas, where voters overwhelmingly affirmed the right to an abortion, lobbyists plan to ask for increased state funding for the centers.
More money could buy more ultrasound machines, which the centers use to encourage women to carry a pregnancy to term. To counter criticism that the centers don’t provide medical care, some are hiring medically trained staff and putting registered nurses in charge. Advice & Aid is one of about 2,500 crisis pregnancy centers in the United States, at least a dozen of them in the Kansas City metro.
Regional Statistics and Presence
| Location | Number of Centers |
|---|---|
| Missouri | 73 |
| Kansas | 38 |
| United States | ~2,500 |
Strategic Goals and the Cultural Narrative
“In general, the goal of a pregnancy resource center is to make abortion ‘unthinkable’ by compassionately serving women and meeting their needs through their pregnancies and after the baby is born,” said Debra Niesen, the lead consultant for Pro-Life Ministries for the Archdiocese of Kansas City in Kansas. Alissa Gross, the chief development director for Resource Health, which operates four crisis pregnancy centers in the Kansas City area, senses change within the anti-abortion movement. She states, “We need to actively participate and be willing to get in the trenches and get our hands dirty and do what we need to do to change the cultural narrative.”
Advice & Aid Pregnancy Centers has two exam rooms, both equipped with an ultrasound machine. Supporters hope the numbers and scope of these anti-abortion crisis pregnancy centers will only grow, while critics continue to label them “fake clinics,” calling their marketing “misleading.” Online search for abortion can take you to an anti-abortion center, and websites take action as a checklist to identify anti-abortion pregnancy centers becomes more prevalent.