A Message from our Board Chair & CEO, from the FY18-19 Annual Report.
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For more than four decades, Family Tree has been helping people and families discover their strengths so they can create lasting, positive change for themselves, their families and our community.
To help drive this work, Family Tree maintains a focus on fiscal strength and stability to enhance the organization’s financial foundation. This approach contributes significantly to our efforts to help maximize the potential of thousands of individuals and families to overcome and end the interconnected issues of child abuse, domestic violence and homelessness.
We’d like to recognize multiple achievements this past year laying the path for improved and increased programming for individuals and families:
- After 40 years known throughout the community as Women In Crisis, Family Tree renamed our domestic violence emergency residential program to Roots of Courage to emphasize the strengths-based approach we take in this program, and in our work overall and to better reflect a commitment to serving all people.
- Family Tree took specific actions to address and improve compensation for our team members, incorporating a new organizational compensation philosophy that helps the agency begin to break free from low-pay approaches that have beleaguered the notfor-profit sector for many years.
- The Family Tree Board of Directors approved a revised public policy advocacy plan, the most significant overhaul in more than a decade, helping the organization to be a stronger and more nimble voice on behalf of individuals and families on their journeys toward safety, strength and economic independence.
- In late 2018, Family Tree executed a long-term lease for four buildings on the former Excelsior Youth Center Campus in Aurora, now called Oxford Vista. These buildings will be the home of Family Tree’s GOALS (Generational Opportunities to Achieve Long-term Success) Program, serving families experiencing homelessness using a multi-generational approach.
- In the spring of 2019, through a generous award from a capacity-building funder, Family Tree took critical steps forward on an ambitious continuous improvement project designed to significantly enhance the organization’s approach to measuring the impact our efforts have in boosting clients’ success toward bettering their lives and improving our community.
On behalf of our passionate and dedicated team members and Board of Directors, we thank you for investing in and trusting Family Tree to empower change and transform lives throughout the metro Denver community.
Sincerely,
John (Ted) Clifton, Board Chair
Scott Shields, Chief Executive Officer
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