Children, Youth & Family Services Needs a New Home

Did you know that 21% of children in our community live in poverty, or that only 40% of Charlottesville children live with both parents? Children, Youth & Family Services has been serving central Virginia's children for 88 years. During the past year alone, they reached over 3,500 children in low-income or at-risk families addressing the issues of poverty, abuse and neglect, parenting, child care quality, teen runaways, and early learning, including social and pre-literacy skills.

During recent years, CYFS has grown and expanded its reach in the community. CYFS has outgrown their current building, forcing them to conduct most of their educational and training programs off-site, as well as creating an urgent need for more space to fully meet the needs of their counseling clients, among them victims of child abuse and runaway teens.

Hearing of the CYFS need, local philanthropists Jim and Becky Craig purchased a wonderful nearby office building with almost twice the space of our current location. The Craigs have made a lead gift of $500,000, have generously agreed to pay for renovations and lease the building to us rent-free while we raise the money to purchase the building ourselves. When completed, this building will be beautifully renovated in every detail and highly energy-efficient as the result of numerous improvements to the structure and HVAC system.

Our goal is to raise $2,000,000 by the end of next year. Pledges received by this time will help us meet a challenge grant from the Perry Foundation. Including the Craigs’ lead gift, the Perry challenge and pledges from all 23 members of our Board of Directors, we have raised $1,236,610 toward this ambitious and important goal. Your pledge will help CYFS acquire this valuable asset in a great city location that will position us very well for the future as we continue to remove barriers to success for the kids and families in our community.

For more information, please contact Erin Garvey at 434-296-4118, ext. 233 or via email at egarvey@cyfs.org. And be sure to visit our website at www.cyfs.org.