1. 1970Jean Jacobs begins a life-long campaign to help children in the juvenile justice and foster care systems. Countless juvenile justice advocacy efforts in San Francisco, and much at the state level, can be traced back to Jean’s groundbreaking work.
  2. 1975Gertrude Coleman, impressed by Jacobs’s resolve, leaves a small trust to the San Francisco Foundation to support Jean’s advocacy and create Coleman.
  3. 1978Coleman hires Margaret Brodkin as Executive Director to expand Coleman’s mission.
  4. 1978Coleman releases scathing report on the SF Comprehensive and Emergency Services (CES) system for dependent, abused, and neglected children, with a recommended set of reforms.
  5. 1980Coleman incubates the Youth Advocacy Project (YAP) targeting the delinquency and dependency systems and advocating for the removal of status offenders from Juvenile Hall to alternative placements.
  6. 1983Juvenile Court judges approve YAP’s plan to establish a central receiving facility to limit the placement of status offenders in the Youth Guidance Center (YGC); Youth arrested for truancy or running away are no longer jailed and are instead treated at Huckleberry House. The new community-based system includes 24-hour intake at shelters and creation of 60 new family shelter beds.

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