The Alliance is a collaboration among social service agencies in North, Central, and South Alabama to provide:

• crisis stabilization and permanency planning in a therapeutic foster care setting.
• individually designed home-based services to help families safely care for their children in their own homes.
• permanency planning and reunification services through contracts with the Department of Human Resources.

The Alliance’s vision is that every child will have a safe, stable, culturally competent and permanent home with the resources to achieve their full potential.

The partner agencies of the Alliance: Brief bios of each agency follow the list.
Central Alabama Alliance – Gateway, Agape of Central Alabama, Children’s Aid Society, and Glenwood, Inc.
North Alabama Alliance – Gateway, Agape of North Alabama, Children’s Aid Society, and Childhaven

Agape of Central Alabama Inc.
Founded in 1979, this is a licensed child lacing agency with its home office in Montgomery and branch offices in Birmingham, Enterprise, and Mobile. The agency provides family-based foster home services, supervisory services to the majority of the children in its foster homes, targeted case management services, and a family based shelter program.

Glenwood Mental Health
Incorporated in 1974 as a private, nonprofit organization devoted to the provision of treatment and educational services to autistic, mentally ill, and emotionally conflicted individuals. The agency offers educational and day treatment services, vocational training, residential care, consultation and training, as well as extensive community based services including individual/family counseling and behavioral aides/respite services. Glenwood Mental Health, Inc. is licensed by the Department of Mental Health/Mental Retardation and is a member of the Child Welfare League of America.

Children’s Aid Society
A licensed child placing agency that provides both out-of-home and in-home services to children and their families. It has a long history of providing foster care, including a contract for DHR placement and supervision of special needs children and provision of in-home services and adoption services. The agency is licensed by DHR, a member of the Child Welfare League of America and United Way of Central Alabama, and accredited by the Council on Accreditation of Services of Families and Children.

Gateway
The lead agency, Gateway was founded in 1891 as the Mercy Home, which served as a foundling home, orphanage, industrial school, and “home for aged women.” For more that 30 years, Gateway (previously Family & Child Services) has offered counseling and residential treatment services, with the modern agency also providing education, consumer credit, and prevention services. Gateway is a founding partner of the United Way of Central Alabama, accredited by the Council on Accreditation of Services for Families and Children, and a member of the Child Welfare League of America and the Alliance of Children and Families.

AGAPE of North Alabama, Inc.
Founded in 1969, Agape of North Alabama is licensed by the State of Alabama as a non-profit child-placement agency which supervises regular foster care as well as medically fragile foster care. AGAPE also provides adoption services and counseling for individuals, families, and maternity clients. It serves Alabama’s 22 northern counties and is headquartered in Huntsville.

Childhaven, Inc.
Childhaven is a licensed child-placing agency with its headquarters in Cullman, Alabama and has served Alabama’s neediest families and children for over 50 years. Childhaven currently operates six different programs: basic foster and residential care, teen mom and baby, transitional living, independent living, and a college program.

The Programs of the Alliance:

STAR (Stabilization, Treatment, Appraisal and Reunification) addresses the special needs of children who are in crisis, cannot remain safely in their home, and for whom a complete and thorough assessment is needed to determine the most appropriate placement.

WRAPAROUND provides individualized in-home services that enable a family to care for their children without removal from their home.

CONCURRENT WRAP works with children and families towards reunification.

CONTINUUM OF CARE provides a spectrum of intensive reunification services for children in out of home placements, such as foster care, moderate residential treatment, mother and infant services and relative placements to achieve permanency for families.

Admission Criteria:
Must be referred to the program by Jefferson County DHR and Montgomery County DHR for Central Alabama; Madison County DHR, Morgan County DHR, Lauderdale County DHR and Limestone County DHR for North Alabama and Mobile County DHR for South Alabama.