30 years of shining a light for kids in foster care
The folks who started it all in 1995
Piedmont CASA founders Tracey Hopper, Carolyn Achenbach, Ed Wayland, and Stephanie Commander. Not shown: Kimberley Emery.
For 30 years, thousands of people in our community have kept the light on for kids in foster care. On October 8, 2025, many joined us to celebrate three decades of caring, sharing, and daring to believe in a better future for everyone.
The Event
On October 8, more than 200 guests, including current and former Piedmont CASA Advocates, staff, board members, and community supporters, gathered at the King Family Vineyards to honor Piedmont CASA’s legacy of service to children in foster care. The celebration featured the premiere of a new video about our work and its impact on our community, “Shining a Light for Kids for 30 Years”.
A Brief History of Piedmont CASA
In 1995, five people decided it was time for the most vulnerable children in our community to have CASAs – court appointed special advocates for children in foster care. Tracey Hopper, Ed Wayland, Stephanie Commander, Kimberley Emery, and Carolyn Achenbach proceeded to build and launch Piedmont CASA. The Charlottesville Area Community Foundation and the Junior League of Charlottesville provided the startup funds. The first office was a room in the Old Albemarle Jailhouse for a part-time director and two Advocates who served two children in Charlottesville/Albemarle.
Throughout the thirty years since then, Piedmont CASA has been partnering with the community, recruiting and training nearly 900 citizens to become effective advocates for children in foster care. Today, the office is a house on High Street, and by the end of the year, Piedmont CASA Advocates will have helped change the story for more than 2,600 children.
Since 2013, the Piedmont CASA service area has expanded from Charlottesville and Albemarle to include the counties of Louisa, Greene, Fluvanna, and Madison. In 2017, Piedmont CASA custom-designed and launched the Bridges to Success program to strengthen support for older youth in foster care. On October 23, the program will be honored as a Champion of Mentoring by MENTOR Virginia.
30 years of making a difference
- Trained over 850 CASA Advocates.
- Served more than 2,600 children and youth.
- Invested more than 193,464 hours in advocating for children and youth. That is the equivalent of 4,825 work weeks, or 92.78 years.
- CASAs have attended close to 7,000 hearings and submitted nearly 2,000 court reports.
- Of the 15,626 recommendations in those court reports, 11,466 were accepted by the court (73%).
- When cases closed, 45% of the children served by CASAs were reunited with their family. Almost all children were in homelike settings rather than institutions.
30th Anniversary Committee
PCASA Event Coordinator: Ann Douglas Irby
Stephanie Commander
Pam Edmonds
Kate Gunter
Erin Hall
Erin Schneider
Linda Walker
Three decades of standing by children in foster care
Piedmont CASA is on a mission to champion and restore children and youth whose lives have been compromised by abuse and neglect.
