Pasco Kids First Inc

Our organization is determined to produce societal value through the dedicated work of our four component programs: the Child Protection Team of Pasco, Healthy Families Pasco-Hernando, the Trauma Treatment Team of Pasco and Hernando Counties and the Sexual Assault Victim Exams Program.

Our goal is to offer services that help keep kids safe, assist them in overcoming the traumatic effects of abuse and neglect and provide parents with concrete support, education and coaching to help them raise their children successfully.

Pasco Kids First has prevention, assessment and treatment programs to address the full spectrum of child abuse issues.

Healthy Families Pasco-Hernando is a primary prevention program that provides high-quality, in-home parent education and coaching as well as family development plans and activities. In so doing, we provide direct benefit to the children in these families who have greatly reduced risk of being abused or neglected, higher rates of timely immunizations, well-child medical visits, and greater stimulation through the use and encouragement of developmental play and educational activities. Parents have greater self-sufficiency by accomplishing educational/vocational goals. Preventive investments in families help to avoid the substantial costs to society of abusive or neglectful experiences, low educational attainment, anti-societal behavior or poor health outcomes.

The Child Protection Team provides medical examinations of the highest standard, forensic interviews and assessment activities to victims of alleged abuse and neglect. In so doing, we provide direct benefit to the children we see by advocating a course of action that provides them with safety and security, either in their family home or through an alternative placement that helps create a safe and secure environment. By helping to keep children safe we thereby avoid the substantial costs to society of long-term debilitation as a result of continued abuse and neglect.

The Trauma Treatment Team provides specialized therapy intervention services to traumatized children and their families by highly-trained and credentialed therapists. Utilizing the most effective clinical interventions, children and family members of all ages overcome significant emotional barriers to effective functioning without which would result in high societal costs for hospitalization, long-term mental health care, and the cycle of abusive behavior.

We provide value to our community by being an effective and efficient organization that is an excellent steward of the federal, state and local government funding we receive as well as the support of caring community members, corporations, philanthropies and professional partners. We monitor all expenditures carefully through accurate record-keeping within the standards of good accounting practices and maintain low administrative costs for each of our programs. We document this accountability in annual financial audits as well as our budget presentations to our Board of Directors and diverse funding bodies.

Pasco Kids First has been providing services in Pasco County for 30 years and Hernando County for 12 years. The agency continues to grow from 5 employees to now 46 employees. Several of the employees have been with their programs from the beginning which provides a wealth of experience and knowledge. The agency also promotes skill development and training to stay on top of research and new techniques to meet the needs of our community.

In 2018, Pasco County had more than 6,600 child abuse reports and the Pasco Kids First Children's Advocacy Center provided services to 1,473 children through child abuse assessments and therapy services. The Healthy Families Program served 252 families with 461 children. The Trauma Treatment team provided over 3000 hours of therapy to 325 children and families.