David Baker Shares the Legacy and Impact of the Sacramento Children's Home.

David Baker: [00:00:00] The worst thing that happens to foster kids, really, is that they move around from foster home to foster home way too much. So, our program, The Source and CalFERS, is really designed to try to slow that process. But I think what's important is understanding that there has to be a full continuum of care, and that sometimes does include even our residential program.

You know, kids come to our residential program sometimes. And they're just not ready for the intimacy of maybe a foster home anyway. And they get some intensive services, they get a lot of support, and we try to get them back to a family member or to foster care.

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I look forward to more engagement with you as we continue to grow and better serve our nonprofit community. Thanks. This episode is a story that no other children's institution or organization in Sacramento can match. As I'll be talking with the gentleman responsible for the operation of a community icon, a beloved institution, and a source of support and refuge for many.

Protecting children, supporting families, and working toward the prevention of domestic violence and substance use disorders, the Children's Home is an oasis for families and children in [00:03:00] crisis. David Baker is CEO of the Sacramento Children's Home, an institution that has provided hope for children and families in crisis since 1867.

Yes, 1867. He's been with the organization since 2013. He'll share the children's homes evolution from a simple orphanage to a comprehensive service provider offering foster care, mental health support and crisis intervention. We explore their commitment to prevention and early intervention programs aimed at keeping families together and the vital role of crisis nurseries in Sacramento County.

Our discussion highlights the extensive support network that Children's Home provides, celebrates the inspiring success stories of the program alumni, and underscores the power of community partnerships in fostering a brighter future for all showcasing the legacy and unwavering love that continue to drive the Children's Home, preventing abuse and neglect for thousands of children annually.

David Baker, welcome to the nonprofit podcast network. [00:04:00] 

David Baker: Thank you. Thanks for having me and thank you, Jeff, for really providing this opportunity, but also to all the nonprofits locally that have had an opportunity to come on with you. It's a great venue. It's a great opportunity to share the work that people are doing.

Jeff Holden: Well, this is a special one because you are certainly one of the most iconic organizations in the community, in the city, and even in the region for all that's been going on for well over a hundred years. And mid 1800s, if I'm not mistaken. 1867. 1867. Not very many people can sit in that chair and say we've been around since 1867.

Yeah, so 

David Baker: I wasn't there, just to be clear. In 1867. Oh, it feels like it sometimes. Yeah, I'm sure sometimes. 

Jeff Holden: You know, you've grown from a children's home. Where originally that's all it did to so much more and so many more services and programs From what used to be, you know, the youngest in our community to now up to 18 in some cases even up 26 years old [00:05:00] Correct.

David Baker: Yes, 

Jeff Holden: tell us about some of the programs and The, the history that got us to where we are today and, and the envelopment of what takes place there today. 

David Baker: Sure, um, you know, Chilm Chalm really is, I know we've been there 157 years and so now we're sort of a staple in the community, but really started as a grassroots organization, a community based organization.

Not to go too long on the long history, but Elvira Baldwin really started the children's home because there was kids living down on the river and essentially what we would call, you know, unhoused or homeless kids and she was trying to make sure there was a place for them. And so that just sort of developed into an orphanage and for many years was operated as an orphanage, but even during that time, was often responsive to what the needs of the community was at the time.

So we had for a long time in the early 1900s, we had what we called the stork nest, which is very similar to what we do with our crisis nursery now, just because there was a need. But over time, it's sort of developed into more of a, I'll say a [00:06:00] comprehensive child and family service organization. So, we do still serve foster youth, but we only have 16 foster youth that live on campus.

That's, that's primarily due to, I'll just call it a combination of federal and, and, and state regulations that have limited us to 16 at this time on our campus. But most of what we have done over the years, you know, as time has evolved, since we moved away from being an orphanage, There was a time where probably 90 kids lived on campus, maybe 100, and there were some kids who lived out in the community as well.

But over time, we've really turned into more of a prevention and early intervention, mental health, a lot of different supports, including residential, which still remains important, part of the continuum of care for foster youth and options. But it's not as used as heavily today because we know we have a lot of other programs that can, one, keep kids with their families.

to support kids in foster homes if they are removed from their families and, and hopefully, help break a [00:07:00] cycle of abuse that leads to kids having to be removed. So, so the majority of our programs now are either prevention programs, early intervention programs, or mental health and crisis support programs.

Jeff Holden: And they're not just necessarily for the individual, but for the families of the individual as well. So they fully encompass. 

David Baker: Yeah, we, we serve the, we serve children and families together and so, and sometimes we have, you know, sometimes we'll get connected to a family because of one child who needs support and that turns into a full menu of services that can support the, the other kids in the family, but also in many cases, the family.

Jeff Holden: In terms of, let's start with maybe the smallest of the small, that's the, you know, the crisis nursery. What causes one to end up there? 

David Baker: Yeah, so we have two crisis nurseries, one's in the south, over in Southland Park area, and one's in the north, over off of Pasadena. Just recognizing that, you know, In terms of getting folks when they're in need, uh, it, it helps to have [00:08:00] locations in both spots.

But what usually leads to folks using the, the nursery, and just to be clear, the nursery's open to anybody in Sacramento County who has a child zero to five who needs support. So that means they could, they could come to the nursery because they have a need for an emergency childcare situation and they're worried about losing their job and they may just be there for six hours, eight hours until they're finished with their shift.

Or they could be experiencing some sort of Domestic violence situation, we have folks that come in experiencing homelessness or, or at least having some challenges in those areas. They, it's a safe place for children for an hour or up to 30 days. So, the average length of stay is probably no more than three days, but we do have, we do have kids that, that stay for 30 days.

But what's important about that is what we provide is a safe, loving, caring, place for these children to be while our case managers can work with families about resolving whatever the crisis was and helping them get the support they need [00:09:00] for long term. Sometimes in the moment, you just need someone to help you.

You know, I always think about it like, I have two kids. So when they were little, I I needed help. My wife and I needed help. And we got that help from family members, friends, and that sort of thing. But not everybody's always in a position to have that. So the nursery fills that role for a lot of people.

But it takes a little bit further providing case managers and other support for families to hopefully help get them in a position where maybe they won't need to use the nursery at all. But what we try to make sure that we view using the nursery as actually, A positive thing when a family has a situation that could create any sort of safety issue for kids.

We'd rather have them come to the nursery. And have a safe, good place for them, kids will get fed, they'll have a nice place to sleep, they'll get clothes, new clothes, they'll get, you know, all that stuff, they'll have a great time while they're there, and they'll be supported, and then we can help that family, and I, I, sometimes families will say, a woman was telling me recently, Sometimes they would come to the nursery from time to time and then they, the children would be so [00:10:00] excited to come there, you know, and they almost made it easier for them, right?

So like, this is a place where my child seems like, oh, this is a fun place that I go where people take care of me and care for me. It has nothing to do with, you know, maybe they're oblivious to what's going on while they're there, which is great. Yes. You know, so what we want is kids to just to be safe and families to be, get the support they need.

Jeff Holden: Do you see children that come through the crisis nursing maybe on occasion, is that an opportunity to engage that family then in some of the other services? 

David Baker: Absolutely. So one of the things the case managers do is make referrals and, and a lot of times those are referrals to other programs run by the Children's Home.

Sometimes they're programs run by, by other community partners. Really it's just based on, on what the need is. It's not, it's very common for folks who come into the nursery to get referred to our family resource centers. We have two in South Sacramento, one in North Sac. And, and also sometimes get referred to our Counseling Center where we can do a variety of outpatient mental health [00:11:00] programming, especially if those clients coming in have Medi Cal, we can do that through our Counseling Center.

Jeff Holden: And I recognize that Family Resource Center as FRC because I see it referred to in its acronym state in so many ways because I had to, what is an FRC? Which is, is important. Are some of the most used services that you provide, where do you see a lot of the volume coming through? 

David Baker: Sure, so our counseling center certainly has a lot of folks who come through there.

We provide what is referred to in Sacramento County as flexible integrated treatment. So we can, we can support families there having very low level mental health. needs, maybe, maybe just some, some therapy or some other, other minor sort of thing, all the way up to multiple times a week. Maybe if they need some medication support, we have psychiatrists who can see them on all of that sort of thing.

So in terms of number of clients coming through there, we usually have four to 500 clients that are being served in there at any given time. So the nursery obviously has, is a drop in. So we never know [00:12:00] how many kids are going to be there. We, We have, we staff so that we can take up to, between the two, it's around 25, 26 kids.

And it's, depends on ages. Sometimes if we have more infants than we, you know, because of ratios and that sort of thing. We do run, uh, a program called The Source, which is a crisis response program for all of Sacramento County. So anybody in Sacramento County can call The Source if they have a, a child between basically zero to 26.

And so that, that. The client, the 0 to 26 child, so to speak, can call or a caregiver for that person who cares about them can call. And they can provide support on the phone or by text 24 7 and we can send somebody out generally within an hour anywhere in the county 24 7. So that, that becomes a spot where, you know, It's a lot of clients can come through through the source and what we can do is work with them We go out and help calm down that whatever crisis they're having at the time We can work with them and then we can stay with them [00:13:00] and get them connected to some longer term support So certainly a lot of folks come through there and that number is nine one six support So anybody can use that number call or text?

So we run something similar for current and former foster youth for the whole state of California who can also call it's called You Family Urgent Response System, or FERS, CalFERS, but it's very specific. And that's F U R S, correct? F U R S, yes. It's very specific for, for current and former foster youth who are struggling.

And we can, same thing, we can help you on the phone or through text, or we can send someone out within an hour anywhere in the state of California. Now, we don't go out to every county, we'll go out to Sacramento County, but we have partners throughout the whole state that can respond within an hour of the warm handoff, so.

So those, those urgent response programs obviously receive a lot of calls. And so they're serving a lot of kids and families throughout the, throughout the day on all night. Yeah, that's a, 

Jeff Holden: that's a big deal. Yeah, that is a big deal. And then of 

David Baker: course, just, oh, just so also the family resource centers do see a lot of families.

They, they, they're seeing families [00:14:00] on a lot of different levels. They'll do home visitation. with some families and do a parenting curriculum with those families. Those are really designed to often are referrals for folks that might have had a touch with CPS or, or just seeking out some support. They don't have to have had a, necessarily have a touch, but we do get referrals that way.

And the idea is how do we keep these, these situations from turning into any sort of referral to CPS or any removals. Really our goal is to keep kids at home and, and, and avoid, uh, you know, most families Everybody needs help sometimes, so most families, if we can get in early and provide support, the data shows that those kids will stay in the home and they won't have any additional contact with CPS.

Jeff Holden: And for the benefit of the acronym, that's Child Protective Services. Child Protective Services, yes. How many children do you serve in a year? 

David Baker: So, we always have this debate with my quality improvement team, I should say. We probably serve between 000 kids and families here in Sacramento County. And if you include the statewide hotline that I was talking to you, we'll get in the [00:15:00] 14, 000 to 15, 000 range.

So, depending on how you count them, right? So, if someone calls up and they are looking for a referral, you make a referral. It's a, it's a varied thing. We still serve that. That child, but then we have our, on the higher end, we have kids living with us in our residential program and we'll have folks in our, that we've stayed with in our, we have a wraparound program which, which really works to keep kids stabilized and not having to go to higher levels of care.

They might stay with them, you know, for six months or eight months. We have TBS program, which is therapeutic behavioral services and they're in for a very specific time, but that can be an extended period of time and they're working on a very specific behavior. So let's say you have a child. who has a very specific behavior that gets them into difficult situations at school.

So that team will come in and do functional analysis and work with that child and work with the, the family and the, and maybe the school to say how do we reduce that behavior to the point where it's no longer disruptive and affecting. So, It goes through ranges of, of, of kids and how long we work with them.

But if we add them up for the year, it's probably [00:16:00] seven, 8, 000, depending on how you count them. So the reason I say how you count them is like some kids we might work with in January, and then we might work with them again in, in August. So, you know, they wonder, are they one or are they two? So, but yes, it'll, it's definitely in a.

in that range. 

Jeff Holden: It's still an astronomical number. It's a huge number of, of touches and influence you have in the community in a variety of different ways from family to the individual, to the individual in school, to the individual just with an issue at, at home or wherever it happens to be if they call in through the support line.

I mean, that's, that's an enormous responsibility. How about numbers of people? How many people work for you? 

David Baker: So we have about, just, just under 300, probably. Okay. Uh, depending on what day it is, you know. We, uh, we struggle, like everybody does these days, to find enough high quality staff. We'd probably serve more kids if we could find more staff, but, but I will say our, our HR team and our, our managers do a great job of finding people and, and training them and, and getting them all the tools they need, so.

But we, Probably close to 280 to [00:17:00] 300. So, and that depends on how you count them too, because we have, we also really, really lucky to have AmeriCorps folks that work for us. The AmeriCorps is sort of like Peace Corps here. So, so, you know, at any given time I might have, you know, 20 or 30 AmeriCorps who to me are just as, you know, they're part of our team, just like everybody else, but technically not an employee.

So that's where I say around 300. 

Jeff Holden: Yeah. They're, they're not your, your, your. Payroll tax and yeah, and but they're here every day 

David Baker: working with kids and families and yeah. 

Jeff Holden: That's that's outstanding that you have that that other support mechanism is and then you probably have a cadre of volunteers as well I would imagine 

David Baker: we do we have probably Over over the I think we probably could have as many as a thousand a year sometimes Volunteers some volunteers come in and do regular volunteer work We have a couple really great examples of folks that have been working with our kids in residential Or at the nursery for long periods of time and they stick with that.

And then we also have volunteers who come in to work in event or come in and to do a [00:18:00] day, you know, we have companies that come in and they'll do a day of painting or a day of yard work or different things that we could do. So there's always a lot of folks that are interested in and getting involved.

Jeff Holden: We'll be back with more from David Baker on the Sacramento children's home, right after these messages from the people who make the program possible. I was in the media business for over 35 years and had the great privilege of working with Runyon Saltzman RSE, Marketing, Advertising, and Public Relations.

We collaborated on many different campaigns, but their commitment to the non profit sector hasn't changed since their founder Gene Runyon started the agency. Over many years and many campaigns, Runyon Saltzman has been committed to improving lives by tackling California's most challenging issues, guided by research informed strategies and insightful, creative solutions.

RSE develops innovative communications campaigns that raise awareness, educate and reduce stigma in diverse communities throughout our state and beyond. To learn more about [00:19:00] RSE, visit rs e. com. 

Scott Thomas: Hello this is Scott Thomas with CAP Trust in our Sacramento office. I specialize in working with local non profits and associations.

Annually, we survey private and public nonprofit organizations across the country to better understand challenges they see in today's environment. In our more recent survey, we heard concerns about proper board governance, mission aligned investment, and how to implement all term investments. If you would like a copy of the survey or to discuss your organization, look me up, scottthomasatcaptrust.

com. 

Jeff Holden: I'm thrilled to have Western Health Advantage partnering with us as they do so much to support so many non profit agencies in our community. As a truly local health plan, you'll find individual and family options, employer options, plans for CalPERS and Medicare Advantage. From medical services to pharmacy, health and wellness support, as well as behavioral health care, Western Health Advantage has a [00:20:00] plan that fits what you need.

As an employer, for profit or non profit business, individual or family. You can find more at WesternHealth. com. Let's talk a little bit about the funding for the organization. And by the way, your annual report is, is one of the cleanest, simplest I appreciate you saying that. to, to, to read through. 

David Baker: Good.

We've worked a lot on Trying to really be transparent and share what we're doing and, and, and how we, and how we're having an impact on the, on the community. 

Jeff Holden: Yeah, and I say that for the benefit of the other nonprofit leadership that may be listening to say, hey, this, this is a good one. You can see how it's distributed very clearly.

As well as for somebody in a philanthropic sense that's looking to say, do I want to contribute? What does it look like? It's, it's well done. It's a big budget. You work with a, a large organization. What is the total budget you work with? 

David Baker: So it runs around 29 million this year is what we're projecting. So some of that is, depends on if you're, you know, will we get to that number?

Has a lot to do with, do we, do we connect with enough people and, and hire enough staff to be able to do that? [00:21:00] So I'd say it's close to 29 million for all of the programs. 

Jeff Holden: And the majority of the funding comes from, State and or county provided services, correct? 

David Baker: Yeah, we have contracts with the county. We have state contract.

We have contracts with First 5 Sacramento. And so that's all sort of a blend. Some of the county funds are actually a mix of state and federal funds. And some of the state funds might be just state funds. It's, it's a, it's a bit of a blend, but I would say it's. You know, governmental funding, so that's the majority of what we do.

You have a small percentage 

Jeff Holden: then that's fundraising. What, what 

David Baker: does that look like? So, so not all of our programs are fully funded. So for example, the nursery is, we have a great relationship and we have a great partner in. First five Sacramento and they fund I didn't bring numbers with me So but they fund let's just say in 800 and something thousand maybe 850 or so Yeah thousand a year, which is terrific and then we'll have to raise another 1.

2 million to operate the two So that's sort of how everything is broken down most of our programs with the [00:22:00] exception of our mental health programs Which are generally fully funded We, we bring in some, some fundraising dollars as well to make sure that we can first meet the need of the community and also make sure we have high quality services and we, and we really, it's really important to support our staff to our staff working with kids and families that we do.

They're, you know, they're real, they're real heroes at times and we want to make sure that, that, you know, we're, that we're able to pay them in a way and provide benefits to them in a way that's. recognition of what a great job they do and retain these wonderful people. And so, so the programs that aren't funded to the degree that would be able to, to meet those needs, we, that's where the money goes to support those.

So we wouldn't be able to bring as many kids into the nursery if we didn't fundraise money. We wouldn't be able to see as many families and we wouldn't be able to have as high quality of staff and as many staff as we do to serve the communities through our family resource centers. If, if people didn't support, and same, actually same for residential.

Residential is not fully funded these [00:23:00] days either. And so, to make sure that those kids, I mean the foster youth that we have in our residential program, have, all have trauma histories that really, create a situation where the most support we can get them, the better, right? So that means providing a good environment for them, making sure they have access to all of the services that they need and make sure that there's people around that are willing to support them even when they're having a hard time.

Jeff Holden: What do some of those events look like? The, the fundraising events. 

David Baker: Oh, events. So in terms of raising funds, we do events, but we also have folks that just support us in general. We have a few really, our largest events for the year. We, we partner with a group called PINK, which is, uh, philanthropy inspired by the needs of the community.

Group of women who started that organization several years ago, and they started partnering with us to put on what we call our Lux4Life Big Gala event. That just happened a few weeks ago. It was terrific. We also host our annual crab feed. Many people will say it's the best crab feed in the region. Uh, they'd be [00:24:00] right.

And, uh, it's a great, it's a great place. It's a great, it's an unbiased opinion. It sells, you should come, it sells out every year and you won't see anything like it when we start those auctions and start selling those cakes and other things that they make for those. We also have, we partner with a lot of folks in the community.

Recently, there was a big, we do the SAC century. It's a hundred mile bike ride. Oh, the bike ride, yeah. Yeah, you don't have to go a hundred miles, but that's, it's, a lot of people do. And that's, that's through a partnership with Sacramento Rotary. And the Rotary does a terrific job, the downtown Sacramento Rotary, definitely the outstanding Rotary around here.

One of the longest standing Rotary programs. And we partner with them. The proceeds from the, that ride benefit the nursery. Okay. So another thing is we do have a, what we call our crisis nursery sustainer circle. People give monthly. Okay. Yeah. Yeah. That's a, that's a big program for the nursery because that's an, it's an ongoing need.

We know every year we're going in for over a million dollars that we have to raise. And it never goes down. You know, the cost, uh, cost to run things goes up, you know, we pay people [00:25:00] more, electricity costs more, gas costs more, insurance costs, everything costs more. Doesn't ever seem to go backwards. No, it doesn't.

So, so, you know, so we struggle with that. So those are the, those are the main events. I think there's a lot of other events. It's one thing that this community is so good about is they really, people. Organizations want to raise money and they, and they'll look to find a partner. And we, we get that partnering with us has shown to, to a really great way to have a great event and raise a lot of money and to go for a good cause.

So, and so why I do have a philanthropy department that does help support all of those events. Many of them are, are what I would call third party events. You know, there's, there's a, there's some different golf tournaments that occur. There's a big softball tournament that occurs and those are all put on by other.

Those are the 

Jeff Holden: ones we love. Yeah. Cause you just get the proceeds, you know what I'm saying? 

David Baker: Yeah, well we actually, we're in a position, I think our team really helps support those folks too because when you're trying to put something like that on, our network, it's just us sharing gets a lot of people to show up.

You're right, because you have 

Jeff Holden: such a broad network [00:26:00] of people. Yeah, 

David Baker: and we have so many volunteers, when you put on something like the, I mean, gosh, the Rotary brings in so many volunteers, but when we, when we partner together, it's just really amplifies that because we have our volunteers, we have the volunteers who always volunteer for Rotary events and Rotary members like myself show up to help with those things.

So it's, it's really sort of amplifies the, the, the impact that you can have. 

Jeff Holden: You're mentioning one group, the Rotarians, which are so significant, so many community organizations. Yeah. Who else do you collaborate with? And I can only imagine, because of all your services, there's a, just a cadre of people that are Yeah, 

David Baker: I mean, I mentioned this, the, the Pink.

I mentioned them. And we have, we still have a guild that's called, it's an auxiliary of ours, that's called the The Friends of the Crisis Nursery, so that's a group that does, they do a nice event every year. The last couple years they've done it at Track 7 Brewery, but they've done it at other places as well, but they've done a really nice job with those, and they bring in dollars, that sort of thing.

So [00:27:00] for fundraising, those are the main folks that we probably Oh, I'm sorry, yeah, I'm 

Jeff Holden: talking about your collaborations in the community. Oh, 

David Baker: outside of that, We're part of our family resource centers. There's nine birth and beyond family resource centers in the community. We run three of them. So, so we're part of a birth and beyond collaborative.

That's that that's doing a lot of work to, to keep families together and to provide support to those families. We also. part of the California Alliance for Children and Family Services which is a statewide organization that we partner with and we're a member of to try to, to move at times to make sure the word is getting out about what's really needed and educate people about some of the difficulties that are happening in the, in the state related to foster youth or mental health and that sort of thing.

And then inside. the, like in the FRCs, the family resource centers, we partner with local folks that in those neighborhoods. So if we're in Valley High, we partnership with other organizations, like minded organizations like Rose Family is over one that comes to mind that we partner with over in [00:28:00] Valley High.

So just a variety of folks that they can make sure that we're reaching the folks that we need to reach. And. We partner with Weave on a lot of things. We, they Domestic violence. They come in and provide domestic violence counseling for our clients in our family resource centers. We, uh, we offer them some office space and we work out that they come out and provide services that way.

Different times, we've partnered with different community groups around. We bring in dental clinics. We bring in Dr. Wilgus. He has arranged, Dr. Wilgus is a dentist, local dentist. He's arranged to bring in, Traveling dentists that come in with a van and they get services to our clients and they might be needing that so there's Anybody we've in the past we've had Sac State bring in nursing students.

So we try to partner with whoever makes sense 

Jeff Holden: Yeah, that's that's fabulous because I can see so many organizations that either by referral You know, in to say, Hey, here's a place you can get to because they can't, they can't service it and or using their services as a, as a benefit to, to your community at [00:29:00] large.

David Baker: And we have some built in things on our first five contracts, which is our family resource center. Some of our family resource centers, first five contracts. It's a, it's a very complicated weave of. Funding at the family resource centers, but also at the nursery so that we have we share some information back and forth so that When anybody comes into one of those funded programs, they can make referrals automatically out to the other to the other first five funded programs We make referrals to help me grow and some other stuff in the community So, but what's important is that that's all done in collaboration with the client.

We don't just send out information about people, you know, but sometimes we, we can say, you know, we can make a real quick connection for you. And one of the biggest things that they do at the source, which is the urgent response thing is getting people connected to providers for mental health services.

So sometimes that could be one of our programs, but sometimes it could be, you know, River Oak or Stanford Youth Solution or Stanford Sierra. Yes. Whatever they're called now. Yes. The, the, the revised names. Yes, yes. Laura does a great job over [00:30:00] there and, uh, we, we, we make referrals over there and, you know, there's a lot of different community partners that we make referrals to, especially for mental health services.

Jeff Holden: If money were no object, what, what would the organization look like? 

David Baker: You know, I think it'd look a lot like it does now, it would just be, we'd be able to provide even more services, right? So, so the nursery is limited to the number of kids that we can go at our two locations based on two things. One, on license capacity.

Ah, okay. And the, a bigger driver of that is the number of staff that we can find to, to work there. We have some really, some really amazing staff who work at the nursery, but finding those folks and having enough of them, I don't know. It's always a challenge, and I think people will tell you these days it's hard to find employees.

And especially employees that are trained and that are passionate and that care about our mission and our vision. and share our values around how we should be working with kids and families. So, so if, of course, you'd like to think a driver of that is being able to pay people [00:31:00] enough money, but we have a woman who works in our residential program who's been there for 45 years.

Oh my gosh. Working directly with the kids. So, you know, so it's clear that she doesn't, She's not there because of the amount we pay her, right? Otherwise she would probably have moved up into another position, but she's still a childcare worker because all she cares about is making sure that these kids have the care and the supervision and the love that they should have.

So, so we're really looking for those people, but I think, you know, obviously if funding was unlimited, then we would be able to pay those people a lot more money and we might be able to find them easier. Right. Right. So, so that would be one thing. I, I really firmly believe that. There's a role for our residential program.

It's much smaller than it used to be. There's, because there are kids at times that they're not ready or they're, for whatever reason, the, the, how they manifest their trauma and the behaviors that they have, it's difficult to, to, to manage them in a home based setting. But certainly if we could, put enough [00:32:00] services in place, maybe those kids could stay and never be removed, but those kids sometimes are in the foster care system.

The worst thing that happens to foster kids really is that they move around from foster home to foster home way too much. So, our program The Source and CalFERS is really designed to try to slow that process. But, so if money was unlimited, we'd make sure that those families had everything that they needed so that kids wouldn't have to move.

But I think what's important is understanding that there has to be a full continuum of care, and that sometimes does include even our residential program, you know. Kids come to our residential program, sometimes, And they're just not ready for the intimacy of maybe a foster home anyway. And they, and they get some intensive services, they get a lot of support, and we try to get them back to a family member or to foster care.

So, those, that program is not funded to the degree that, That it should be, I think, in the state of California. So funding for foster care at all levels is not funded to the degree that to really meet the need. So if I had [00:33:00] unlimited funds, I could make that place. I think, I think we do a pretty great job with the kids now, but you know, you could provide even more support if you had more revenue, right?

You know, I mean, that's just a reality. Uh, it's just not to take away from the work that's being done. I think that we have some pretty incredible people that, that work with, uh, with kids that end up in residential care and more importantly, the kids that we have in residential care, they get what they need while they're there and we try to connect them back to back home or back to foster care where we have more and more kids that are just going to exit from us out into the world.

And we have some staff who work on making sure that they're prepared for that. So they do a good job of that. 

Jeff Holden: And now coming back to reality with the budget constraints that we all have to work within, what's the greatest need you've got? at the children's home. 

David Baker: We have a need to make sure that we can continue to find high quality staff that really care about the mission and the vision, are passionate about kids.

That's, you know, some of that is funding enough so [00:34:00] that, you know, honestly, it's really sometimes the funding on that is really about how do we, how could we make sure that these folks can stay in this business, which means paying them enough money that and having opportunities for them to grow inside our agency or outside is really important.

But workforce development right now is a real struggle. There's not enough licensed social workers and, and therapists to fill all of the need. So, so if, if we could get, if we could, if we could get more folks on that track, you know, in college and, and otherwise, that would be good. We have a need to continue to grow what we would call like our peer support.

So I think there's been some good strides in California to recognize how important having folks with lived experiences and have an avenue for them to get involved in working with kids and families without having to necessarily get a degree and get licensed. But but they've created some certification programs for those folks which have been really positive.

Some of our peers and our what we call family partners. [00:35:00] are sometimes much more effective in supporting families than a licensed therapist is. And then sometimes the other way around, right? So, so, the more we could look at getting those folks involved and, and creating avenues for them, I think would be good.

I think it goes without saying, every time The nursery comes up, there's no natural funding source for crisis nurseries, that's why there's not very many of them. Okay. And so, you know, if, if we could, if we could, we always need to raise money for the nursery and we always need to, to, to figure out how we can have more of a natural support for that, you know.

If there was a natural funding for that that was built in, I think, I think we would, we'd be able to even grow it. Mm hmm. People are always asking for a third site, you know. But. There's no, First 5 has been a great partner in helping support the nursery. Actually, so has Sacramento County Department of Children and Family Services.

They have supported the nursery. It makes a lot more sense for someone who's struggling to be able to visit the nursery than have to get involved with child protective services [00:36:00] and have their child removed when all they need is a little help, right? You know, a little, little support during that difficult time.

So funding for that. is, would be terrific. It's always hard to find staff for that program, but that's related to making sure we can pay people a reasonable wage so that they can do it. Right. You know, and then I think just, I think you were asking about what's needed. I think that on the residential side we've had what we, what state has done, what's called continuum of care reform.

You may have heard about it. It's a lot of reforms with the idea of. doing a few things. One is keeping kids in their family if you can, making sure that kinship care is available, meaning that they could, they don't, if they can't be with their biological parents, that they could be with their aunt, their uncle, their grandmother, and that those folks would be supported in a way that they could do that.

But, but really what I think is important is that as we build out more support for youth and trying to keep them out of congregate care situations like residential programs. Well, we've seen in the news where kids are, you know, stuck in [00:37:00] social worker offices or hotels or something like that. The reality is we need a strong continuum of care so that when there's kids that are in these positions where there's no place for them at the time, that there is a place for them.

And so, some of the regulations and the funding related to that. has resulted across the state of California for less and less beds to be available for those kids in residential care. And while it's never our goal to have kids in residential care, what I think is important is that in that continuum that, that those kids have a place.

That there's an opportunity for them. So that they're not sitting at a shelter and they're not sitting in a social worker's office for days at a time. And so, so programs like that, like ours and there's others across the state, becoming more and more difficult to preserve those beds for those kids when needed.

So we don't need 90 anymore at the Sacramento Children's Home, but we certainly need some because when, when there's a kid that's in need, we want to be there. So funding for that has become a strain, but we have incredible support. People, [00:38:00] people understand the need to help support kids in foster care and kids that are in residential care and in this community.

So we have our kids, they come into our program, and they get all of the required stuff, and they get all of that. But I will say at the Children's Home, because of the community, they also, we have fun snow trips, camping trips, all kinds of things that a lot of kids have never experienced. And they experience it their first time when they go on a snow trip with our staff.

First time they've 

Jeff Holden: seen snow, right? Yeah, some of them. It's 

David Baker: amazing to me. Some of them have, we've gone on camping trips in the snow and they've never experienced that. They go, this, this summer they went on a, a great multi day adventure sort of camping thing that they did. And those are, those things are not funded through the, the traditional funding sources, right?

Those are all different. Because we have a great support here in, in, in Sacramento. And, and, well, we're about to hit our holiday season. And if you've ever been to the children's home during the holiday season, it's quite a sight, the amount of support that comes in from the community. Donation of [00:39:00] gifts, and bicycles, and toys.

The kids in residential are well taken care of related to that. But, but what's really nice is that we'll give out thousands of toys and, and grant wishes for thousands of, of kids across the whole region through all of our programs. Some of the, and, and we have some great supporters who also won't just, just bring in toys.

Like, so you can come, you can come down and get a star and you can go out and you can buy that gift and we'll make sure it gets to that child. You can pick which child you want. I'm supporting a five year old or I'm supporting a 16 year old, right? It looks different. But we have some great supporters too that now come in and adopt whole families because it's really great when kids, you know, have some toys under the tree, but we work with families that, you know, we'd like to have something there for everybody.

And we've had some great supporters comes in, some of them are companies, some individuals who come in and they'll just buy everything for the whole family, 

Jeff Holden: which is really great. It's wonderful. It makes it easier for everybody. 

David Baker: Yeah, it sure does. When, when we have toys for kids that we give and our staff will [00:40:00] go out and bring them to the home that you can see the parents, they're so excited because they were really worried that their kid wasn't going to get much.

And now here's some really great stuff for them, but they're just overwhelmed. Yes. You also show up with, uh, A new set of pots and pans or For the family? Yeah, for the family or, you know, whatever, whatever they needed. You know, parents won't normally ask for things for themselves. They want to take care of their kids.

So when we do the adoptive family, it's nice because we kind of force them to say, well, what do you need? Right. And, and we take care of that too. . Yeah. Because if you ask them, they're just gonna tell you what they need for their kids. You know, that's, that's a universal thing, right? Yes. For, for, for parents.

So it's really great that we get, have people who support adopting a whole family, you know, so. 

Jeff Holden: Let me ask you about success stories. I know you've got a few. 

David Baker: Yeah, sure. 

Jeff Holden: And, and, and I say that, you know, very, very sarcastically almost, you probably have so many. Tell us a couple of stories of people who have gone through the program and it really has benefited and now they're wonderful contributors to the community.

David Baker: Sure, [00:41:00] sure. We have a, we have a woman who is on our board. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. And, and, and if you go on our website, you'll see videos and her talking about her experience. She would do a ten times better than I will ever do. Yes. Trying to explain her And we're going to refer everybody to that website too. But she, she was, you know, found herself with a young child and, and didn't have a lot of support just like I was talking about earlier.

You know, you usually turn to family and friends, but if you're, if you're in a position where you don't have that at the moment, she was really lucky someone referred her to the nursery. And over the years, she used the nursery on and off, but, and now she has, you know, her and her husband, you know, it's kind of interesting because, you know, her child used to come as a baby, but now she's, I don't know, she's a teenager or something.

So, it's pretty amazing. But what, what's amazing to see how, you know, Just a little bit of support every once in a while. She was able to finish go to school She's she's working, you know and has built up her own support system, but she'll tell you that sometimes She refers to you know The [00:42:00] the old adage of takes a village and she really talks about how for a moment in time where things were really tough for Her the only village she had was the nursery, you know, she has a whole bunch of support now and you know And, but to see somebody do that and use the nursery and, and then, and now have built up her own network of support and, and for her to want to come back and be part of our board and make sure that, that, that our program is available for other moms and other families in the future.

It's really heartwarming to see someone who says, you know, the program was there for me, so now I'm going to come and be there for the program. She's been one of our greatest, I'll say one of our greatest advocates and, and, and to hear her, you know, like I said, I won't be able to do it and she tells her story and I think we have some videos of it, you know, the room, everybody will be in tears, right?

So. But what, but we also have folks who just call up and, and they, they check in and they just say how, how important it was for them, whatever program they were involved with. It's very common for folks to come that were part [00:43:00] of our residential program. They come to tell us, they come to tell somebody that was a big part of their life, you know, here's what I'm doing that's good.

You 

Jeff Holden: know, 

David Baker: you usually tell your parents that, or you, you know, you tell your family that. So, so they come to the children's home to do that a lot. They're always looking for, is so and so still here? Is this person still here? I want to tell them how, you know, how well I'm doing and what, you know, what I'm going through and all of that.

And so it's great. And they'll just show up unsolicited from time to time. Yeah. Sometimes those folks will be nice enough to, to show up at one of our events and talk about their experience as well. You know, I think it's well documented, there's a gentleman, Miles Cooley, who's an attorney down in LA who's.

It's very outspoken about over the years, not just about the children's home, but just about the need to make sure that foster kids get the support that they need. And when we had our 150th anniversary, he came and told his story about how he was living at the children's home. And it was a, it was Ended up being adopted and had such an impact on his life that he shares that now with a lot of folks.

So those people do, do come by from time to time and [00:44:00] share and sometimes they'll come out and talk. And I think we, like I said, we'll on our video, we'll have videos on our website of some of those folks talking about their experience. But it is, it is helpful because I will say a lot of times you don't get to see the, the, the fruit of your work, so to speak.

Right, right. Yeah. Not to go off on this too long, but Friday, I was at Habitat for Humanity, volunteering there, hanging siding on a house over in Oak Park, right? You know, it's just a great, great organization as well. And so I was down there working all day and, and had a great time. And I was doing that with a group from Rotary, but I've also done that as just as a volunteer.

But At the end of the day, I said, Oh, look it, we have this, this, this house is now has a, you know, all the siding up, you know, so it looks so actually looks straight. I was just shocked since they had me doing it. So, um, but they have a great group there. But my point is, if you work at a place like that, that does great work, every, when the, when the house is done, you see, here's the house and people move in.

It's not always like that at the children's home. Sometimes you, you [00:45:00] work with a child or a family 15 minutes and you, and you may never work with them again in our, in our crisis support. Or a child might come into the nursery for a couple days and then we, and we help them and we don't see them again.

Or you have, you know, kids live in residential for, you know, 7 or 8 months and we may not see them again. You don't really see day to day. Sometimes you do, but you don't get to see all the times like what is the result. And. And that's when kids come back or adults come back, you know, and they come back and talk about how, what a difference it made in their life or they call up, they do call a lot and they'll, they want to talk to somebody and tell them, you know, what a difference it made for them.

It just takes a, it's just a much longer game, right? We don't see the result for 10 years or 15 years, but it is nice to see that result. It's great to hear it 

Jeff Holden: too, because it gives everybody that insight. of we're doing something positive, making a difference in somebody's life. Even if it was, like you said, just that 15 minutes.

David, what's the best way to [00:46:00] learn about the organization? 

David Baker: The website is good, kidshome. org, but the best way is to come and take a tour. And you can come out and take a tour of the main campus. We just, main campus is like 16 acres, so, you know, you just kind of see where the buildings are and hear about the services.

It's not really a, you won't see, you won't see, you know, clients and things like that, right? Right, so. It is a beautiful campus. But it's a nice, you probably came out and took the tour. I did, yeah. And also, same with, we can also tour the nursery for folks who are interested in that. Although, You know, we try to limit those around, you know, confidentiality stuff too, but, but we can, we do like to have folks come out and see what a, what a nice place it is.

You know, the, how, how, how wonderful we make the nursery for kids coming in and, and, and the facilities on campus are really great. Well, that's the best way. You can also attend an event, you get to hear, and if you want to hear about, I mean, we try, often we have people come and speak at the events. They want to share their story.

And so that's a really great way to, I mean, we don't always have folks at those events, but a lot of times we do, like I said, those tend to be just based on people [00:47:00] just show up and say they would want to share and we'll say, Hey, do you want to share it to a bigger group? So 7 to 8, 

Jeff Holden: 000 a year of them is a large number of people that you've impacted.

David Baker: And for 157 years. So we do have to do the math on that one. We have a lot of great, I can't say how, how wonderful our board is and they're all volunteers, but you know, many of them have longstanding histories as well with the children's home, whether it was, you know, their parents or their grandparents volunteered or, or sometimes they live there, you know, depends on which, which folks, you know, and they, and they've, they've come back and said this, I remember as a child, my mom volunteering here.

And so now I want to make a difference. So it's, there's a lot of different ways to do that. But. In terms of finding out, a tour is great, the website is great, attending an event, all the events are on the website. Mm hmm. I think the next big event is the crab feed, so, uh, hurry up. Which we know is the best crab feed in the market.

It is, and it's gonna sell out super fast, it always does. So, we'll have 400 people there, and it'll sell out, and 

Jeff Holden: That's a big crowd. 

David Baker: At least 400, maybe, maybe more, I don't know. Ha, [00:48:00] ha, ha, 

Jeff Holden: ha, ha. Well, I have to thank you. You know, I'm privileged to have the ability to, to now speak with you, because you have a lot of work to do, and, and I, I really appreciate taking the time to speak with us.

From All the things and all the people that are involved in all the children and families and services that you provide. Thank you. And, and to your team and to everybody involved and to, to maintaining what you have to maintain, you know, an organization that's over 150 years old, you have a lot of responsibility in your hands and, and a lot of love in the community for it.

Yes. So I'm glad you 

David Baker: said that. Cause that's really the word that I think is most important is about the amount of Love that we have. I think that's that comes from our staff. It comes from our volunteers. It comes from our supporters They they really do care and we have a great team. Yeah, it's a lot of responsibility But it's one of those things where you have such great people around you.

It's really more of a How could we not succeed? Well, it's pre with, with the group that we have and the volunteers that we have. 

Jeff Holden: Well, you're, you're creating a, certainly a sustainable resource for the community [00:49:00] that is a, a preservation of something that's been around for so, so long. Yeah. And for that, you know, I, I thank you and, and appreciate what you do.

David Baker: Yeah. Well, I'll steal something from Jim Harbaugh and I'll say, well, who has it better than us? And that's what we, that's, that's sort of how I view the children's home. Who has it better than us? We have an opportunity to. to serve kids and families, but we have a great community and a great group of staff that support that, so.

Jeff Holden: Well, saying it from Jim Harbaugh to a Chicago native, I appreciate that. Yes. Thanks, David. I appreciate it. All right. Okay.

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