Surrogate Parents in California: Appendix D (https://www.cde.ca.gov/sp/se/sr/documents/surrogateparents.pdf)
California Court-Appointed Special Advocates
In 1977 a Seattle Superior Court Judge named David Soukup was concerned about trying to make decisions on behalf of abused and neglected children without enough information. He conceived the idea of appointing community volunteers to speak up for the best interests of these children in court. He made a request for volunteers; 50 citizens responded, and that was the start of the Court Appointed Special Advocates (CASA) movement. Today there are thousands of advocates serving in California alone. The mission of the California CASA Association is to enhance and strengthen CASA in California and support individual programs in their efforts to provide quality advocacy services to all abused and neglected children in the juvenile courts through the use of trained CASA volunteers. These volunteers build close relationships with and serve as one-on-one advocates for children in foster care. Over 40 CASA programs in California recruit and specially train these volunteers from the community, who are then appointed as advocates by a juvenile court.
For the most current information and details about the CASA program in your area, visit California CASA’s websit e at http://www.californiacasa.org .
Chapter 4 – Procedural Safeguards, Charter SELPA
Page 103
As of 11/18/2016
Made with FlippingBook - professional solution for displaying marketing and sales documents online