Our History

63 years ago, parents of children with developmental and cognitive disabilities founded We Care to address their at-risk children’s lack of treatment options.  These parents understood the complex needs of their sons and daughters and forged an agency that has since evolved to address a broad range of developmental and mental health concerns – all while keeping the focus on each child and family and their specific strengths. 

We Care’s services have evolved and expanded to encompass a wide array of developmental, educational, and mental health programming.  As our understanding of the true roots of social, emotional, and behavioral problems has grown with the available research, many of our programs have moved focus to treat the impact of trauma related to neglect and family or community violence.  The positive results of this shift confirmed the value of these changes and today, thousands upon thousands of children and families have graduated from We Care’s programs with dramatically improved outcomes.

Developmental Services: Early intervention in the first three years can significantly improve intellectual, physical, communicative, adaptive, and emotional developmental outcomes. Too, these services strengthen each family’s ability to advocate and care for their children.  Programs include developmentally enhanced low-income preschool classrooms, parent-child developmental playgroups and a relationship-focused classroom for toddlers with autism.

Mental Health Services: Early intervention mental health programs improve outcomes for children facing the likelihood of significant emotional and behavioral disruption of their development.  Studies have shown that mental health programs delivered early and effectively create significant and lasting improvement in areas of parenting stress, abuse, empathy toward the child, and, in the child, improvement in cognitive and social development. Programs include attachment-based clinical services, a family-driven wraparound program, a preschool consultation program for preschoolers at risk of expulsion and intensive foster care services.

The at-risk children we serve are predominantly low-income and BIPOC children of families living in Contra Costa County.  We Care focuses on the children that need us most at the time when we can have the greatest impact.