From the Hope Choice Board of Directors:

Hope Choice has great respect for all of those who have worked hard for the petition and its corresponding ordinance. We thank the City Council for their hard work on the issue of life. These men are godly, prolife leaders. We place much trust in all of them and their leadership. All have taken valuable time and care to search out this issue. We applaud your commitment to the value and worth of all lives and the efforts to provide protection to the unborn.

The mission of Hope Choice Pregnancy Centers and Mentoring Programs is to equip, mentor, and strengthen future generations. The Hope Choice Board of Directors made the decision at the beginning of this process not to make a public statement. It was our belief that our role was to continue to serve pregnant Amarillo women as they make real decisions about life and death. We were asked to speak at a City Council meeting and that is to this date, the only public statement we have given.

We are certainly for putting a stake in the ground in Amarillo and declaring that all lives are valuable, precious and worth protecting. The staff, board and volunteers of Hope Choice and ministries like it give their time, talent and treasure to provide help for scared and overwhelmed women to allow them the opportunity to deal with and navigate their situation, making it possible for them to choose life for their babies.

Christ followers in Amarillo, the City Council, Hope Choice, the initiating committee and the petition signers all agree that life is precious and valuable. We agree that through the love, forgiveness and hope found in Jesus, women will be equipped to choose life. That is simple.

The ordinance proves to be more complex. The ordinance would do many wonderful things for our community. The ordinance would prevent a biowaste company within the city limits from disposing of aborted babies being shipped into Amarillo from out of state. The ordinance would declare Amarillo a Sanctuary City for the Unborn which would mean abortion cannot be done in the city limits. The ordinance would also prohibit the abortion pill being mailed to Amarillo residents.

Parts of the ordinance that one should read through and understand would include the sections related to “Abortion Trafficking” and the “Private Right of Action”. Also, the ordinance refers women needing help and support with pregnancy services to a website that only lists government funded agencies, not faith-based organizations like Hope Choice.

We must be careful not to take action that makes woman feel even more isolated and alone. Women need to feel safe to receive counsel, prayer, support and practical help so that they can choose life.

We and you have been charged with serving and leading in Amarillo. Please consider Amarillo women and babies as you make your decisions with this ordinance. If we truly care about the lives of babies, and we do, then we must love, support and help the women who are making life and death decisions.

Hope Choice opened our doors in 1988 as the Amarillo Area Crisis Pregnancy Center offering free pregnancy tests and a few benevolence items. We have been serving our community for 36 years this year. We have now grown to a multi-location ministry offering many kinds of services to the clients that we have the honor to serve.

Over the past 36 years, Hope Choice has ministered to 228,820 clients through pregnancy center services alone. Last year, we interacted with clients more than 10,000 times through classes, programs and services!

Those on the proabortion side of the issue, often claim that we only care about the baby and our help and commitment ends as soon as the child is born…not so as it relates to Hope Choice.

We provide:

• Pregnancy Tests
• Ultrasounds
• Abortion Pill Reversal Protocols
• Parenting classes
• Childbirth classes
• Baby Safety classes
• Classes for Dads
• Benevolence items (diapers, formula, furniture, clothes to size 4T and maternity clothes)
• Financial help
• Strengthening relationships classes
• Mentoring programs
• Retreats and Events
• Summer camps
• College ministry
• Bible studies

Our ministry is 3-fold, we serve men, women, teens and families before they find themselves in an unplanned pregnancy, we minister to people in the midst of their crisis, and then we continue to journey with them following that situation. All of our pregnancy services are free of charge and confidential. We don’t receive any state or federal funding. All of our support comes from churches, private grants and from individuals.

The stance that believers must take regarding life and abortion is clear cut and simple. We must love and protect the unborn. We are called to love and support the mothers, as well.

We are thrilled that Roe was overturned which allows states to decide on abortion.

We applaud the Heartbeat Bill. Senate Bill 8 is also known as the Texas Heartbeat Act. It prohibits a physician from performing or inducing an abortion after a “fetal heartbeat” has been detected. The law does make exceptions for medical emergencies.

Women do not have abortions because they are legal. They choose to have an abortion because they are in overwhelming, dangerous, difficult and frightening situations.

The arguments we hear sound nothing like what you hear in political discussions. A real live, young woman experiencing an unplanned pregnancy never says, “It’s my body. You can’t legislate morality. Abortion will be a great choice for me.”

A prolife feminist named Fredricka Matthews Green says, “No one wants an abortion like she wants an ice cream cone or a new car, but like an animal caught in a trap willing to gnaw off its own leg to escape.”

Platitudes and propaganda in no way aid a frightened and overwhelmed young woman facing a life and death decision.

Women need support, prayer, counsel and practical help to push back the darkness and silence the chaos in her life.

In 2023 alone, 923 pregnant women came through our doors considering an abortion, and of those 919 chose life!  99.6 % had a change of heart!

Amarillo is and has been a city that values life and seeks to protect the unborn. We would be remiss not to applaud and recognize that in 1988 many leaders met together to start the Amarillo Area Crisis Pregnancy Center. For 36 years, that center has served our community well and is completely funded and supported by our godly prolife community now known as Hope Choice. The Council preceding this council made a declaration affirming and supporting the Heartbeat Bill. At one time, there were 19 Planned Parenthood facilities in the Panhandle, we are now down to only one remaining, Haven Health Clinics who do not provide abortion in the city limits.

We stand on the shoulders of giants. People who for decades declared through their actions and efforts that Amarillo is a Sanctuary City for the Unborn.

Many strong, faithful, committed, prolife believers have gone before us. Hope Choice and its staff, board and volunteers and many other ministries across the Panhandle spend our lives protecting the unborn, loving woman and helping them to choose life, educating teens on how to live a healthy life, providing healing and support for women who have made the devasting choice of abortion and helping to equip parents in how to be strong, healthy parents.

Statistics show that the vast majority of woman are choosing to have elective abortions due to life circumstances. Amarillo women who find themselves facing a pregnancy and considering abortion as their only way out of a terrible and difficult situation, those are the women we must consider when we consider ordinances for our city. These women are often alone, afraid and dealing with abuse, abandonment, addiction and fear.

For these life circumstances, there is no simple answer.

The best hope we have is to encourage women in these situations to visit a ministry like Hope Choice, where she will be met with care and concern. We will not benefit financially from her decision or her life circumstances, but we will take time to hear her heart and situation, to walk with her as she navigates the struggle, obstacles and difficulty she faces. By offering the hope found only in Christ, we will help her deal with the factors making her feel like abortion is her only escape. It is that hope that allows her the opportunity to choose life. On the other side, having chosen life for herself and her child, she and her baby will find their footing, dust themselves off and pursue a much healthier, happier and fulfilling life.

Please join us in praying for our community as the ordinance makes its way to the ballot in November. Hope Choice is praying that the lives of women and children, both born and unborn, would be valued and protected. We are praying that the Body of Christ in Amarillo will continue to come together to serve our community through the love of Christ.

For Life, The Hope Choice Board of Directors

• Greg Burgess, President
• Jeff Sumpter, Vice President and Treasurer
• Carol Rohane, Secretary
• Rick Trafton, Member
• Grant Smith, Member
• Trent Taylor, Member
• Dr. John Young, Member
• Dr. Erica Wheat, Member
• Michael Haning, Member
• Jeff Jackson, Member
• Candy Gibbs, Executive Director