About Us
Arrowhead Foster Family Agency (AFFA), founded in 2001, is a small 501 (c)(3) non-profit organization that is dedicated to providing children in need the best possible homes. Resource parents serve as a stable and supportive family for children who's circumstances vary, including: neglect, abuse, abandonment, drug exposure, violence, etc. Our ultimate goal is to reunify children (ages newborn to 21 years old) with their biological families. However, we understand reunification is not always possible. Since our start, we have worked with close to 1,000 children. We are an experienced, caring, informed staff working for more than 16 years together!
Our Mission and Purpose
The purpose of the Agency is to provide for the care, supervision, and well-being of children/NMD's (non-minor dependents) placed with the Agency and to provide them with the kind of ongoing therapeutic services and skills training which will meet their problems and needs. The Agency's services are individualized and family centered. The primary goal of the FFA program is to ensure these children/NMD's are provided with a continuity of care, nurturance and services that are culturally relevant, trauma informed, and age and developmentally appropriate that will meet their individualized needs and those of their families as prescribed by their needs and services plans. A secondary, but no less primary goal, is the achievement of legal permanency for children/NMD's. When family reunification has been determined by the court and placing agency not to be a viable option and a child/NMD's case goal has been determined to be achievement of legal permanency through adoption or guardianship, the Agency will work towards these goals.
Our History
Since the beginning, the Neumen's have worked towards a single purpose: providing safe, nurturing, and appropriate homes for children in need. Before the founding of Arrowhead FFA, Russ and Jill Neumen, co-founders and current directors of the agency, operated group homes in the Los Angeles area specializing in servicing the needs of runaway teenagers. Having lived and raised their own children in Lake Arrowhead, they realized the demand for a foster agency on the mountain. Since their first permanent placement in 2002, Arrowhead Foster Family Agency has been running strong, working with close to 1,000 young people in the local mountain and high desert communities.