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Corporate Headquarters in
Egg Harbor Township
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Family Service Association is a private, not-for-profit social service agency whose purpose is to promote the physical, emotional, spiritual, social, and economic well-being of families and individuals, to contribute toward the development of positive family relationships, and to help individual family members to realize their full potential. The mission of the agency is to strengthen individuals and families.
Family Service Association was incorporated in 1909 as The Organized Charities of Atlantic City. At that time, the primary function of the agency was to provide tangible relief for individuals and families in need. In 1919, the name of the agency was changed to The Atlantic County Welfare Board. It was felt that this name was more appropriate for an agency whose objective was the rehabilitation of families who were or might become dependent, and the removal of preventable cases of misery and destitution. With the development of public welfare programs, the need for tangible relief decreased and the emphasis began to shift toward counseling. The agency changed its name again in 1937 to The Social Service Bureau of Atlantic City. In 1938, the agency became a charter member of the Community Chest of Atlantic City, assuring a sounder basis for operating after many years of financial uncertainty. In 1953, the agency experienced its last name change, this time to Family Service Association.
Family Service Association offers a wide range of programs
and services to residents in Atlantic County and in all of
South Jersey. Among the programs and services offered are:
Outpatient Services which provides individual, marital,
family and group counseling for mental health; First Day
Partial Care Program which offers adult partial care
services; the Family Success Centers provides counseling
and day care services to families in an effort to prevent
abuse and neglect; Older Adult Services which include
Senior Community Independent Living Services (S.C.I.L.S.),
Activities of Daily Living, and Eye Screening Services, which
cover the seven southern New Jersey counties, and Project
SAVE which offers respite services to caregivers caring for
individuals with Alzheimer’s; Family Preservation Services
which assists families in crisis and provides in-home stabilization
counseling and case management services; H.E.D.S. (Home
Electronic Detention System) Case Management which provides
counseling and case management services to adolescents who
have been discharged from the detention center on the H.E.D.S.
program; Children and Adolescent Services assist young
people with emotional problems to remain with their families
and avoid psychiatric hospitalization through SafeHarbor,
a partial care program for adolescents;Rainbow Place,
a partial care program for children, and the Youth Case
Management Program which monitors children who experience
psychiatric problems and links them with appropriate community
resources; School Based Youth Services provides assistance
to students in Pleasantville High School; the Pleasantville
Family Success Center and the Egg Harbor Township Family
Success Center which were designed using the school based
model and operate under the “one-stop shopping concept” provides
services to youth and their families in targeted communities;
the Individual Development Account Program which is
a matched savings program to help families become economically
self-sufficient; the Kinship Wraparound Services Program
which delivers client assistance funds to purchase goods
and/or services, which are necessary to maintain safe and
stable home environments for kinship caregivers and the relative
child(ren) in their care; the Kinship Guardianship Program
which assists kinship families in obtaining Kinship Guardianship
through the courts; and the SAIF Program which provides
intensive case management services to individuals and families
who have exceeded their 60 months of TANF assistance.
FSA also provides training and technical assistance. The
South Jersey Training Institute, the
Board and Care Operators Training, and the
Adjustment to Vision Loss Program are three services specifically designed as technical assistance to community partners. The
South Jersey Training Institute provides professional training to individuals and organizations throughout the southern region of New Jersey, specifically targeting social workers and counselors, corporate management, and direct line staff.
