About Us

Champion. Partner. Advocate

The California Alliance: The collective voice for organizations that serve children, youth and families

The California Alliance of Child and Family Services is the unifying force in the charge to lead change and provide support for the state’s children, youth, and families.

For those dedicated to improving the lives of these at-risk populations, the California Alliance stands apart as the champion and leading voice for organizations that advocate for children and families, and for advancing policy and services on their behalf.

When you join the California Alliance, your organization’s voice is amplified and its mission is advanced. That’s because our expert staff and consultants advocate proactively to impact policy, legislation, and budgets. When our advocacy, expertise, and effectiveness are paired with your organization’s mission and services, children, youth, and families win.

The Catalyst Center

The Catalyst Center is a leading training and technical assistance organization representing the interests of child and family serving professionals in the state of California and beyond.

The Catalyst is committed to advancing evidence-based innovations that support diverse communities, and dedicated to research and evaluation that promotes social justice in these fields. As one of the cornerstones of this work, our resource center prioritizes research, capacity building, and peer connection methods that elevate the voices and realities of historically marginalized communities and those that are most impacted by the work of community-based organizations.

The Catalyst’s work complemented by the consultation and thought leadership of policy advocates with the California Alliance of Child and Family Services who maintain extensive expertise in a variety of fields including juvenile justice, child welfare, prevention, behavioral health, adoption, foster care, and residential services.

Passionate representative for California's vulnerable populations

More than 150 chief executives of organizations that serve California’s most vulnerable populations trust the California Alliance to provide legislative and regulatory advocacy to the governor and the Legislature, as well as a host of state departments including: Health and Human Services, Finance, Mental Health, Social Services, Education and Community Care Licensing.

Member agencies rely on the California Alliance to:      

• Unite an engaged, expert network of California’s leading nonprofit child and family service agencies.
• Provide trusted leadership to organizations that serve the state’s most vulnerable populations.
• Deliver trustworthy resources, policy-area expertise, real-world experience and sought-after guidance.
• Represent a collective voice in pursuing an aggressive agenda of advocacy to bring change.
• Act as a galvanizing force in uniting public and private child and family serving agencies.
• Fulfill a commitment to accreditation, high standards, best practices, successful client outcomes and top-quality continuing education.
• Recognize innovation and excellence in service of children, youth and families.  

Member agencies rise to every occasion

California Alliance member agencies leverage their subject-matter expertise to support thousands of children and their families statewide.

Our member agencies are diverse in size, location, make up and length of service, yet they are singularly committed to improving the quality of care and services provided to California’s at-risk children and families.

California Alliance members have established multi-agency collaborations and networks to offer the services needed to provide safety, security and permanence for children and families.

Services and programs offered by California Alliance member agencies include: 

• Adoptions
• Foster family-based care and treatment
• Residential care and services
• Home and community-based behavioral health services
• Intensive treatment foster care
• School-based mental health services
• Wraparound services and support
• Charter schools
• Family preservation
• Transition age youth services and transitional housing
• In-home intervention and support
• Early childhood
• Prevention services
• Support for kin caregivers
• Psychiatric services and medication support
• Shared family care
• Substance use disorder treatment
• Therapeutic behavioral services
• Vocational and job readiness for youth
  

Committees handle the heavy lifting

As the saying goes, many hands make light work. That’s why the heavy lifting at the California Alliance is handled by the board of directors in conjunction with a host of business and program committees made up of member agency executives and senior level management.

Key California Alliance committees include:

• Adoption
• Behavioral Health
• Education
• Foster Family Agency
• Juvenile Justice
• Residential Care
• Transition Age Youth Services
• Prevention
• Practice Improvement
• Commercial Insurance
• Membership
• Nominating 
• Marketing

Each program area represented by the California Alliance has a committee that determines and monitors the legislative and regulatory agenda in the program area. Member agencies with active programs in California Alliance advocacy areas are allotted one voting member on the corresponding program committee. Committee chairs have a seat on the California Alliance Board of Directors.

Mission Statement: Promoting the health, well-being and safety of children, youth and families in California as a collective voice impacting policy and best practices to strengthen the systems that serve them.

Vision Statement: All children, youth and families thrive in loving, healthy, safe communities.