CASA Of Central Texas, Inc.

The Mission of CASA of Central Texas, Inc. is to advocate for abused and neglected children in the court system by recruiting, training and supporting community volunteers.

The Vision

We believe that every child has a right to a safe, permanent home.

Description:
CASA of Central Texas, Inc. advocates for abused and neglected children in the family court systems of Comal and Guadalupe counties. We do this by recruiting, training and supporting community volunteers. Our volunteer advocates provide direct services to these children by ensuring they receive medical, psychological, educational and other needed services as well as being in the unique position of making recommendations to the Child Protection Court judge on what is in the child's best interest.

As the regional population grows, the number of reported cases of child abuse and neglect increases and, likewise, the number of children in state care also increases. Last year, CASA of Central Texas, Inc. served 231 of the children in state care. The number of children served is directly supported by the funding received.

History:
The court-appointed special advocate system was formed in the late 1970s in Seattle. A hard-pressed child's court judge insisted on finding a way to have a better understanding of the children's cases before him than he could in the 10 minutes per child he was able to give before making a placement decision that would affect the rest of their lives. Throughout the country today, there are over 900 CASA (Court Appointed Special Advocates) programs involving more than 62,000 volunteers. A CASA volunteer advocate acts as a spokesperson for an abused child, works to find needed services (medical, psychological, educational, etc.) and also makes a recommendation to the Child Protection Court Judge about a safe and permanent home for the child.

CASA of Central Texas began in 1985 with a group of people from Comal County agencies who saw abused children become victimized again in the system. They began to recruit and train volunteers who could provide an objective viewpoint in civil cases. The program expanded into Caldwell, Guadalupe and Hays counties and moved to San Marcos in 1995. In the 19 years since then, the organization has grown to over 80 volunteers, who last year served 231 abused and neglected children in Caldwell, Comal, Guadalupe and Hays Counties.

• Current programs, activities and accomplishments
  
  

Last year, CASA advocates provided more than 5,534 hours of volunteer time to help abused and neglected children aged from birth to 17 years who were removed from their homes and placed in state protective custody. We currently have six FTE staff members with 75 active volunteers (1:25 casework supervisor ratio) serving 186 children on 101 cases year-to-date in Caldwell, Comal, Guadalupe and Hays Counties. CASA served children in calendar year 2003 from all socio-economic statuses, genders and ethnic backgrounds.

We present town meetings in each county in an effort to publicize CASA's mission, educate about child abuse and recruit volunteers. We send announcements to churches in each county and have press releases published in newspapers six weeks before each training session. CASA provides our volunteers with a 40-hour training curriculum including classroom instruction, courtroom observation, homework and a post-training interview. We hold new advocate training classes three to four times yearly. In addition, volunteers are required to complete 12 hours of annual in-service training. The CASA staff organizes four 3-hour classes per year, on a variety of topics such as foster care, community service providers, minimum standards/quality assurance and diversity/cultural awareness, so that all in-service hours may be met internally. Volunteers may also choose to attend relevant externally offered classes.

The Child Protection Court (Cluster Court) Judge in our counties relies on the recommendations from CASA advocates, appointed and trained as Guardians ad Litem, to make crucial case decisions. This dependence translates to constant pressure to increase our volunteer numbers. The judge prioritizes case assignments and must make a nearly impossible decision when most cases need an advocate.

Contact person: Norma Castilla-Blackwell, Executive Director, (830) 626-2272, (email)

Office fax number: (830) 626-2272

Address:

1619 E. Common St. 301 New Braunfels, TX 78130 (See a map)

Web Site: http://www.casacentex.org

Last updated on October 26, 2009