Our History
In 1985, the Grand Jury of San Bernardino County approached the Board of Supervisors with a strong recommendation to find a better way to deliver services to the at-risk children that fell under the responsibility of the respective County departments. The Grand Jury had come to the conclusion that some children were receiving multiple services, other children were receiving no services, but needed them, and it appeared there was no communication between the agencies.
Patrick J. Morris, who at the time was the presiding Judge of the Juvenile Court, accepted the invitation to serve as a leader of a task force to investigate the situation and offer a solution. Many concerned individuals, who were in a position to understand the issues being scrutinized, joined Judge Morris in his quest for an answer. The group came back to the Board of Supervisors with a recommendation to form a Policy Council, consisting of heads of all the departments that had a reason to touch the lives of children. This council had a mandate to meet on a regular basis to discuss issues related to children, to work collaboratively to resolve those issues, to share resources when appropriate, and to communicate with each other about cases that needed assistance from more than one agency to have success. The Board of Supervisors accepted these recommendations and implemented this Policy Council in the form of the Children's Network.
The Network/Policy Council met for a number of months and diligently shared problems they were facing within their various agencies, offering assistance to each other when appropriate. However, it soon became apparent that no matter how much they collaborated, there were some resources simply not available within any of their departments. In the past, they individually did what was within their scope to do, and assumed the rest of the problem was going to be taken care of by another entity. Now that they were communicating with each other, they realized that simply was not the case. Many times, children were not receiving the goods or services that were essential to their well-being and they did not know where to turn to find those resources.
Once again, the Board of Supervisors was approached and the Policy Council had a novel idea! This time, the recommendation was to add a non-profit 501(c)(3) component to the Children's Network. This non-profit would be a public/private partnership. The county would assume the overhead costs for the agency, and in turn, the non-profit would guarantee that 100% of donations solicited from the private sector would be used specifically to provide essential resources for at-risk children in the county.
The Board of Supervisors accepted the recommendation, and in 1986, Children's Fund was founded. In 1988, Children's Fund began to educate California lawmakers on Children's issues and work with them on state policy changes to benefit at-risk children and their families. One of the important results was the drafting and enactment of the “Interagency Children's Services Act, Senate Bill 997, in 1989. This legislation made San Bernardino County Children's Network a state model for delivering services.
Children's Fund Board of Directors Chairmen have included Jack H. Brown, Gene Wood, A. Gary Anderson, Matthew A. Jordan, Vaughn Bryan, Lee R. Redmond, Jacob Zeidman, Mark Ostoich, Douglas McAdam, William Meyer, Bob Kain, Joseph P. Barr, Dave Harris, Dianne Crowther, Bill Nietschmann, Russ Moore and Pete Pitassi.
Copyright © 2008 Children’s Fund Tax ID# 33-0193286