A new four-year framework will focus investments around nine community goals.
The Children’s Services Council of Leon County (CSC Leon) unanimously adopted its 2026–2030 Strategic Plan on June 18, marking how the Council will more keenly focus its investment of public resources toward improving outcomes for children, youth, and families.
The plan is a comprehensive, multi-year strategy that builds on its community investments that began following an initial community needs assessment in 2022. The Council was approved by Leon County voters in November 2020 and became operational in 2021. Prior investments include programs spanning early childhood, youth development, family support, food access, housing stability, workforce preparation, and organizational capacity.
Early investments allowed the Council to address immediate needs, fill service gaps, respond to emerging funding challenges, and test new approaches. The newly adopted plan is designed to bring greater concentration on specific areas during the next four years of work.
“Our approval of these strategic goals and corresponding plan informs how we further direct limited resources where community data tells us the greatest outcomes can be achieved,” said Darryl E. Jones, CSC Leon Council Chair and Leon County Schools Board Vice-Chair. “It also reinforces and reminds us all that meaningful and sustained change will require collaboration, shared accountability, and the willingness to say no or not now to some opportunities so we remain focused on the results we have committed to achieving.”
The strategic plan organizes CSC Leon’s work around four categories for funding investments: (1) Kindergarten Readiness, (2) Youth Success, (3) Family Well-Being, and (4) Capacity Building.
Within those categories are nine measurable community goals, including improving kindergarten readiness and third-grade reading levels in Title I schools, strengthening youth mental health, increasing postsecondary enrollment and employment among young adults, expanding meaningful engagement with Family Resource Centers, and reducing child abuse, youth homelessness, and child food insecurity. The plan also establishes a goal focused on strengthening the capacity and effectiveness of organizations serving children and families.
Rather than prescribing a fixed set of programs for the entire four-year period, the plan pairs each community goal with draft objectives and strategies that can evolve as conditions change, new information becomes available, and partners identify stronger approaches. Community indicators and established baselines will serve as long-term measures of whether Leon County is moving in the right direction.
The planning process began in November 2025 with the formation of an ad hoc workgroup. Members consulted subject-matter experts, reviewed updated data from the Council’s 2022 needs assessment, and considered family feedback gathered through surveys administered by existing funded programs.
CSC Leon Executive Director Cecka Rose Green said that Council Members gave the planning process the appropriate time, scrutiny, and thoughtful discussion required to establish meaningful priorities for the next four years.
“This Council approached the work with tremendous care and intention,” Green said. “They asked difficult questions, challenged assumptions, listened to families and subject-matter experts, and remained steadfast to what the data tells us children and families need. I so appreciate the deliberate and demanding work they invested in developing a framework that gives us a clear strategic direction while preserving flexibility to respond as community needs evolve.”
The plan also establishes a clearer connection between community-level outcomes and the performance of CSC Leon-funded programs. Each year, the Council intends to publish performance-based results that show what its investments achieved and how those results contribute to broader indicators identified in the strategic plan.
CSC Leon leaders acknowledge that the Council cannot independently move population-level measures such as reading proficiency, food insecurity, homelessness, or child maltreatment. Its role is to serve as a funder, convener, and catalyst—bringing partners together around shared goals, aligning investments, and supporting programs capable of producing measurable results. That focus will become increasingly important as the Council makes future funding decisions.
Review the strategic goal statements and supporting objectives here.
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