Colorado:
Connecting Families to Community
Support
COLORADO: BY THE NUMBERS
71% of calls screened out with no services provided before the Warmline 3 Warmline pilot counties: Boulder, Pueblo, Gilpin 7,000+ community services available through 211
In Colorado, as in many states across the country, most calls to the child protection hotline are not surfacing abuse or neglect.
is at risk, callers can be routed back to protective services to ensure safety remains a priority. The pilot will run through June 2026 while partners study how the Warmline is used and what support families need most. Early learning is shaping how Colorado connects families to support—not by building new programs, but by helping families access community resources that meet their specific needs. Foster America works alongside state leaders, counties, community partners, and parents to help bring efforts like this to life, aligning policy, financing, and implementation so promising ideas can move from planning into practice.
record of suspected maltreatment, even when what they needed most was help. Leaders in Colorado believed there could be a better response. Through the state’s Reimagining Colorado’s Child Welfare System effort, partners worked together to create the Mile High United Way 211 Warmline pilot. Launched in December 2025, the Warmline offers another option when family needs do not merit an investigation—creating a voluntary pathway alongside the existing child protection hotline. Instead of filing a report, mandated reporters can speak with a trained community navigator who helps find community resources that may be responsive to the family’s specific needs. Navigators connect callers to local services, such as housing assistance, food support, mental health care, financial help, and parenting resources, without triggering an investigation. The idea behind the Warmline is simple: when families are facing challenges, connecting them to the support they truly want and need can make a real difference. The Warmline was designed through collaboration among community partners, parents who have experienced the child welfare system, and governmental leaders. Foster America supported the work by helping partners align practice, funding, implementation, and evaluation as the idea moved from planning to launch. The pilot currently serves Boulder, Pueblo, and Gilpin counties and may expand statewide in 2026. It connects callers to more than 7,000 services through a statewide resource database. Calls are free, confidential, and available in multiple languages. If a child
They come from teachers, doctors, neighbors, and others who are worried about families facing stress or hardship. In 2022, Colorado’s child protection hotline received more than 114,000 calls. Over 71 percent were screened out because they did not meet the criteria for investigation. For many families, that meant the call did not lead to support or services. Instead, families were left with a
Free, confidential, multilingual support
WHAT IS THE REIMAGINING COMMITTEE?
In 2022, Colorado formed the Reimagining Child Welfare Committee. From the start, the group was co-chaired by a lived experience leader and a state child welfare official—and has always included more than half members with lived experience, working and planning alongside those holding formal professional authority in the system. In its short history, the committee has built the trust and courage to pursue solutions to persistent challenges, working to close racial disparities in child welfare, reduce unnecessary foster care placements, and build authentic family voice councils in counties with similar composition and purpose that have true local influence. The 211 Warmline pilot is the committee’s first fully operational test of change, and a concrete
example of what authentic co-design looks like in practice. Reimagining members wrote the script, selected the partners, and defined the evaluation protocols. They continue to review progress, troubleshoot challenges, and serve as ambassadors to mandated reporters, encouraging use of the Warmline in the three participating counties. The Reimagining members’ ambitions extend further still. They are working toward statewide scaling of the Warmline model, developing a housing pilot, and exploring how to end the need for parental rights terminations. A goal that reflects both the depth of their commitment and the seriousness with which this team approaches what systems change can actually mean.
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