PPGC & Me

Myself (tall and center) and other Vox members representing Louisiana at the national Planned Parenthood Youth Organizing Conference in D.C. this past summer.

During my junior year at Tulane, I joined a group of  female students working to reinvigorate our chapter of Vox: Voices for Planned Parenthood. We worked with our local affiliate, Planned Parenthood Gulf Coast, to bring Vox back to Tulane and to maintain a positive and visible presence on campus. That was my introduction to Planned Parenthood Gulf Coast, and I have been excited to work with them ever since.

Now for just a bit of information on the national organization before we delve more into the specifics of the Gulf Coast affiliate. Planned Parenthood Federation of America (PPFA) stands as  “the nation’s leading sexual and reproductive health care provider and advocate.” Planned Parenthood marks its beginnings to 1916 when Margaret Sanger (a piece on Sanger written by Gloria Steinem) opened her first clinic offering birth control in Brooklyn, NY. The organization comes into shape in 1923 when Sanger founded the Birth Control Clinical Research Bureau and the American Birth Control League which came together to form Planned Parenthood. Planned Parenthood has been expanding throughout the United States since 1923,  the organization now works to promote reproductive health and family planning internationally. If you’re interested, here is a more in-depth history and listing of clinics in the United States.

So let’s explore one of its affiliates, Planned Parenthood Gulf Coast. Planned Parenthood Gulf Coast is a regional affiliate of the national organization Planned Parenthood and serves the communities of Louisiana and Southeast Texas. The organization strives to be a positive member of the community by providing strong reproductive health care services which includes comprehensive sex education. Its services includes testing and medication for sexually transmitted infections, screenings for breast and cervical cancer, birth control and pregnancy counseling. The two clinics in Louisiana (in New Orleans and Baton Rouge) offer only preventative reproductive health care services. In Southeast Texas, the clinics offer the same preventative services and a separate corporation associated with Planned Parenthood (as required by state law in Texas) provides abortion care.

Planned Parenthood Gulf Coast, in its present condition, is a recent formation that combined two different affiliates in 2005. Previously the Texas and Louisiana branches were separate affiliates. Planned Parenthood has operated in Texas since 1936, and the first clinic came to Louisiana in 1984.

Planned Parenthood Gulf Coast can trace its roots to the Maternal Health Center founded in Houston in 1936. Shown here is the largest Planned Parenthood medical facility in the country located in Houston.

In the 1980s, the two branches operated under different names, but in 2005 Planned Parenthood of  Houston and Southeast Texas and Planned Parenthood of Louisiana and the  Mississippi Delta merged to form the current day Planned Parenthood Gulf Coast.

Planned Parenthood clinic in New Orleans. Located at the corner of Magazine Street and Marengo Street in New Orleans.

In addition to providing affordable and high quality reproductive health care services for the Gulf Coast community, Planned Parenthood Gulf Coast advocates to protect women’s reproductive choice and access to health care. Circumstances continually require the services of the advocacy branch of Planned Parenthood in the socially conservative Gulf Coast region. State and local legislators challenge the very existence of Planned Parenthood. Planned Parenthood employees work to block legislation that limits a woman’s reproductive freedoms and fight to increase access and quality of reproductive health. In Louisiana the advocacy arm has pushed to encourage and implement state comprehensive sex education. Planned Parenthood Gulf Coast’s relationship with state legislators and local anti-choice activists will be explored in a future blog, but here is a little teaser of  one of the state legislators in Louisiana whose policies Planned Parenthood must combat: