COALITION FOR HISPANIC FAMILY SER
This organization has already been registered
Someone in your organization has already registered and setup an account. would you like to join their team?Profile owner : d******o@h**********************y.o*g
Mission Statement
Coalition for Hispanic Family Services (CHFS) is a New York City community-based comprehensive family service organization serving the Brooklyn communities of Bushwick, Williamsburg, Greenpoint, Bedford Stuyvesant and East New York for twenty eight years and the Queens communities of Ridgewood, Glendale, Elmhurst, Corona and Jackson Heights for eighteen years. Across the communities that we serve, child poverty, unemployment, substance abuse, violence, illness, and/or poor educational outcomes affect a significant portion of the population, which is comprised of primarily Latinos, African- Americans, Caribbean Americans and Asian Americans. While recent changes in economic and social policy have decreased poverty and abated crime in the areas that we serve, change has been uneven, and rapid gentrification has contributed to growing income disparities between residents, as well as cultural and physical displacement of communities of color. CHFS was established in1990 in response to racial and ethnic inequities in the NYC child welfare system. At a time when the population of children in foster care was growing to over 30,000 children in care and there were 60 voluntary foster care agencies in NYC, only 15% of the voluntary agencies were community-based organizations of color. This was a vast comparison to a system where 98% of the children in care were of color and 20% of those were Latino. At the time, CHFS was one of two Latino foster care agencies and 10 minority foster care agencies. Today CHFS is the only remaining foster care agency of color in a system that continues to be overwhelmingly represented by African American and Latino children. CHFS' mission is to strengthen families of color by providing them with culturally competent services that build upon the strengths and values of their own culture and lead families towards a greater degree of self-reliance. This is achieved through a holistic, culturally-competent, multi-generation approach that focuses on the family as the nucleus of individual and community cohesion and growth. CHFS works with the most vulnerable families to address the problems of child abuse and neglect, poor educational performance, HIV/AIDS, teen pregnancy, domestic violence, drug and alcohol dependency, homelessness, and mental illness. CHFS is an active community partner in both Brooklyn and Queens, and is well known for its success in, and commitment to, providing culturally competent and linguistically appropriate services to at-risk children and families. CHFS also has a proven track record of engaging immigrant families, including those who are undocumented.
About This Cause
The Coalition for Hispanic Family Services (CHFS) established in 1990, is a community-based comprehensive family service agency serving North Brooklyn and adjacent communities in Queens where significant numbers of families live below the poverty level. CHFS's programs address family needs comprehensively and within a cultural context, with the goal of moving them towards self-reliance. CHFS operates foster care and adoption services, child abuse prevention programs, outpatient and residential mental health programs, arts and after school education programs for children and youth, NYCHA based community centers and parenting support programs. CHFS is New York City's only Latino foster care and family services agency. The Coalition for Hispanic Family Services is building strong communities....one family at a time. Array of Services: • Creando Raices Familiares/Creating Family Roots Foster Care Program offers bilingual (English/Spanish) services in community based foster care, adoption, home finding, skills building for teens, evidence based parenting education programs and such ancillary services as housing advocacy, education and training for youth, birth parents, and resource parents. • Treatment Family Foster Care offers borough-based placements for seriously emotionally disturbed children who have also been abused and neglected and are known to the child welfare system. With teaching parents as therapeutic agents of change, these children have the opportunity to have their mental health needs addressed while remaining within their own community. • Arts and Literacy Program provides a literacy-based arts curriculum to children and youth as an after school and summer camp program. Through this curriculum the children explore crucial developmental issues of the self, family, community, and relationships. Homework assistance, cultural trips, specialized workshops, and recreational activities are also offered. Parents receive social services, monthly workshops and ESL classes. The program is located in four schools in Brooklyn and six schools in Queens. • Bonding Links/Enlazos Familiares Mental Health Services for Children and Families offers clinical services that will make permanency for children more likely and better enables children to grow up to become healthy adults. The Mental Health Clinic provides psychiatric evaluation, individual, family and group psychotherapy, support services and crisis intervention for infants, children, youth ages 0 to 18 and their families. The Children's Community Residence is a single site residence with group living for eight children ages 8-12 who are experiencing emotional and behavioral difficulties which preclude them from living in a family setting. The Residence provides a supervised, therapeutic environment seeking to develop the children's skills and capacity to live in the community. It works closely with parents to foster nurturance, stability and permanency. • Primeros Pasos/First Steps is a primary prevention program for parents and their babies eight to twenty four months of age. Group services are offered to the parent and child with the goal of fostering a positive, nurturing, relationship between parent(s) and child(ren) through the use of literacy and language building activities. Parents also participate in adult groups that introduce and facilitate goal setting for the parents. Group services are accompanied by home visits.. Ackerman Institute for the Family are collaborating with CHFS in operating First Steps. • Child Abuse Prevention and Family Treatment and Rehabilitation Services engage families at risk of abuse and neglect and provide them with case management, counseling, parenting education and support, and referrals for mental health and substance abuse treatment. The program collaborates closely with other community based programs and sets child safety and strengthening of the family as program priorities. The program seeks to reduce the likelihood of children entering into foster care. •Beacon Center for Arts and Leadership is a community center that provides after school and summer camp programs for middle-school youth with opportunities to create, critically think, communicate, and problem solve through arts-based activities that build leadership skills and empower the young person. Community youth have access to free programming in mediums such as creative writing, visual arts, sports, media literacy, drama, music, yoga, and martial arts. During the evenings and weekends, classes are also available for adults that include free aerobics, ZUMBA and yoga classes, and ESL classes. • Cornerstone Community Centers are based in two Brooklyn NYCHA developments. They provide an array of free programs and activities for children, teens, and adults in the Public Housing Center and the surrounding communities in Brooklyn. They offer after school programming and summer camps for children, and year-round evening programming for teens and adults, including fitness and ESL classes. • Bushwick Community Partnership (BCP) is a group of concerned residents, service providers, faith-based leaders, government officials, elected officials and other stakeholders who by working in partnership are creating a community response to the promotion of child safety and well-being. CHFS serves as the host agency for the BCP. The above programs serve over 7,000 children and families annually.