Family Service of The Piedmont Inc

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Welcome to Family Service of the Piedmont's homepage. We hope this site will be useful to our visitors who share our vision of Building Safe and Healthy Families.
About Family Service
Family Service of the Piedmont is the largest private, nonprofit agency of its kind in Guilford County, NC. The agency empowers individuals and families in crisis to restore hope, achieve stability and thrive through quality support services, advocacy and education.
Agency programs include: Domestic violence shelters, providing safety, therapy, and court advocacy for battered women and their children; Childrens Advocacy Centers, which coordinate the investigation and treatment of child sexual abuse individual and family counseling for victims of depression, anxiety, relationship problems or substance addiction or other mental health issues; free consumer credit counseling to help families reduce debt and avoid bankruptcy or foreclosure; in-home therapy and support for new mothers with heightened stress factors; and family preservation intervention for families at risk of having their children removed from the home.

Operation ELF lets you “play Santa” for Family Service clients who would not otherwise be able to buy gifts for their families during the holidays.

The Oyster Roasts are outdoor casual events that take place each year under a large tent at a private residence in High Point and Greensboro. Ticket price includes oysters and a dinner buffet, beer and wine, and a live band. A raffle is held for fine jewelry and other items.
Together, last years Oyster Roasts raised more than $137,000 to directly help children and families in Greensboro and High Point. With your help, we can have even greater success in 2011!
View photos from the 2010 Oyster Roasts in High Point and Greensboro.

www.clicktoempower.org
The Allstate Foundation donates $1 to the National Network to End Domestic Violence for each person who likes Click To Empower on Facebook.

1 in 5 women report experiencing domestic violence during their lifetime.
More than 13% of high school students report experiencing physical violence by a boyfriend or girlfriend.
Nearly 50% of all female homicide victims are killed by their current or former partner.

Source: North Carolina Coalition Against Domestic Violence
If you or someone you know is in an abusive relationship, break the silence and make the call that has helped thousands of women find safety. Abuse is never OK. You don’t have to be silent. You’re not alone.
24-Hour Crisis Line

Each year, I grow a garden. I start in late winter, planning and preparing the soil. Then in the spring, I cultivate and plant the varieties of vegetable I grow every year. These are the vegetables that thrive in my garden: tomatoes, cucumbers, squash, zucchini, and peppers. Other vegetables, such as watermelon, eggplant, or corn, are delicious and I would really like to grown them too. However, for one reason or another, I decide that I cannot. It may be that the pH in the soil is not ideal, or there is too much or not enough sunlight. Or I may not have the resources, such as land space, to enable them to thrive. For whatever reason, though I continue to love these vegetables, I know my garden is not the best place for them to grow.
I think this story illustrates changes we are experiencing at Family Service of the Piedmont. Our four main areas of service are Victim Services (domestic violence, sexual assault), Consumer Credit Counseling, Mental Health Services (depression, anxiety, Children’s Advocacy Centers) and Family Support. These core programs define our agency, and they are what we do best. Through them, we empower thousands of individuals like Jocelyn [see our recent Newsletter] to overcome issues such as domestic violence, financial instability, mental illness, and familial distress.
As our agencys resources become tighter, my priority is to ensure these core areas are supported. With reductions in funding from grants, government, private foundations, and other revenue sources, we need to relinquish other programs that are taking us away from our core mission (what is known as mission drift). Accordingly, this year Family Service is shifting three non-core programs to other agencies. I believe this is the best way to serve our clients needs as well as to focus our own agencys resources.
For two years, Family Service of the Piedmont administered the Partners Ending Homeless Initiative, with its mission to eliminate chronic homelessness and significantly reduce all homelessness in Guilford County. This July, the Initiative moved away from our agency and merged with the Homeless Prevention Coalition of Guilford County to create Partners Ending Homelessness as its own 501(c)(3) organization. Several former Family Service staff positions were part of the move. I would like to congratulate Partners Ending Homelessness on achieving their independence. I believe the new organization will be more effective than ever at addressing homelessness in Guilford County, and I am proud of the part Family Service has played.
Similarly, as of this month, the staff of our Homelessness Prevention and Rapid Re-housing Program (formerly the Housing Support Team) are moving to the Greensboro Housing Coalition. The Greensboro Housing Coalition has been a partner with us on this program since the beginning. I believe transferring the staff and program to them will be a seamless and worthwhile transition for the clients served.
Lastly, effective this fall, Family Service will no longer provide Substance Abuse Services for adolescents. We will continue to provide Adult Substance Abuse Services, but the adolescent program was beyond the scope of our core mission, and was not fiscally sustainable at our agency. The Guilford Center is seeking an alternate provider of adolescent substance abuse services, and we look forward to working with them to meet this ongoing community need.
I want to make it clear that none of these moves is the result of poor performance on the part of program staff. On the contrary, I would like to commend everyone involved in these programs for the exceptional work they have produced at Family Service. Our loss of these staff members will be another agencys gain.
Family Service of the Piedmont is blessed not only with a terrific staff but also with a large number of committed individuals and groups who support our agency through charitable giving. For instance, through our Annual Campaign and fundraisers like the Greensboro Oyster Roast and High Point Oyster Roast, as well our newest event, the Jamestown Pig Pickin. In the current economic climate, the support we receive from people like you is becoming ever more crucial. I am immensely grateful to every one of you who are willing to give of your time and money to help further our mission. With your help, and by keeping our eye on our core mission, Family Service of the Piedmont will keep building safe and healthy families in our community for generations to come.