CASA History
Since 1978, California CASA has expanded to 52 counties, serving the communities where 99% of foster youth live.
Court Appointed Special Advocates (CASA), a national volunteer movement, began in 1976. Its founder, Seattle Superior Court Judge David Soukup, decided he couldn’t endure any more sleepless nights worrying about the lifelong impact his decisions had on abused and neglected children. At that time, children in foster care didn’t receive the same representation in court as parents did. According to Judge Soukup, in an LA Times interview, “I was consumed by the fact that I didn’t have enough information about each child, and I just didn’t know if I had done the very best job I could.”
Judge Soukup died on December 16, 2023, a day after his 90th birthday. His remarkable life of service will be remembered and his legacy lives on through the work of CASAs around the country.
-Judge Soukup
California CASA was created to empower local programs. Local CASA directors who ran county-wide programs, recognized the need for a state office that could grow and strengthen the CASA network. Together, they formed California CASA Association in 1987. At our founding, only 17% of California Superior Courts had access to CASA volunteers. Through persistence, partnership, and passion for our mission, our network of CASA programs has grown to serve children and courts in 53 counties in California, covering the region where 99% of foster youth live.
Today, close to 1,000 CASA programs serve children in 49 of our 50 states
In 2015, the California legislature enacted new laws (Welfare and Institutions Code sections 101,102, 103, and 109) permitting Court Appointed Special Advocates to offer advocacy and support to youth in the juvenile justice system. In 2023, the Board of Directors of California CASA Association expanded its mission to: ensure that children and youth in the child welfare and juvenile justice systems have both a voice and the services they need to thrive.
In 2024, California CASA commissioned the University of Michigan - School of Social Work to evaluate the impact of the CASA model in the juvenile justice system: From Advocacy to Outcomes: A Randomized Controlled Trial of CASA in Juvenile Justice. A central finding is that CASA volunteers significantly improved outcomes for adolescents on probation. Specifically, youth assigned to CASA volunteers experienced significantly larger gains in their perceptions of academic self-efficacy and overall self-efficacy. Moreover, youth assigned to CASA volunteers were significantly less likely to experience an arrest for a new offense. In fact, the CASA group was approximately half as likely to experience a subsequent arrest (23.7% v. 46.3%).
Currently, 23 local CASA programs also serve youth in the juvenile justice system.