From Lived Experience to Leadership, Charity Chandler-Cole Charts Bold Path

Charity Chandler-Cole was locked up in juvenile hall twice – once for stealing underwear for her baby sister and again for violating the terms of her probation. Her latter transgression: having a job. 

The now CEO of CASA Los Angeles’ Court Appointed Special Advocate (CASA) program was sent to a Lincoln Heights group home, where she had “a horrible experience,” witnessing illicit drug use and various kinds of child trafficking, she said.

“We were used to being used and abused and having to survive,” Chandler-Cole says.

She ran away from the group home, became pregnant and vowed to give her son a different life.

Had Chandler-Cole had an advocate like CASA L.A., which provides for 1,300 foster children, her adolescent life could have been much different, she says.

“If I had a CASA, I highly doubt I would have been in that group home for long.”

CASA L.A. pairs children with trained volunteers who advocate for young people during the often-fraught child dependency hearings that are a hallmark of the foster care system.

“We come in and provide that context to humanize the children and families we work with, to share their experiences and their background… so that judges can incorporate that into their decision-making process,” Chandler-Cole says.

Chandler-Cole, who took the reins in April, is the first person of color – and likely the first person to have experienced the child welfare system – to lead the 36-year-old Los Angeles nonprofit.

Chandler-Cole is focused on building awareness of CASA L.A. in diverse communities and has an aggressive strategy to recruit and organize volunteers of color so that they are more reflective of the youth they serve. Black and Latinx children make up about 85 percent of the population in the foster care system in L.A. County, while about the same percentage of their volunteers are currently white.

“It doesn’t matter how well-intentioned you are or how much you care, if you don’t understand from a culturally competent lens about what’s going on, it’s impossible to lead and serve as you need to,” she says. “That’s why in addition to organizing volunteers of color, CASA L.A. is ensuring that all volunteers, regardless of race and socioeconomic status, are trained and coached on implicit bias, how to be anti-racist and how to show up for youth of another race.”