Wellspring Family Services history

Little more than a year after the Bureau of Associated Charities was established, the financial meltdown called the Panic of 1893 swept the country.

By late 1896 the Bureau of Associated Charities was on the ropes financially, with insufficient funds to continue its work.

Fundraising events in 1908 included a highly successful "tag day," during which an army of volunteers solicited donations in the streets, giving donors "tags" to show that they had contributed.

In 1915, COS contracted with King County, which had opened a Child Welfare Division the previous year, to do all intake processing of new applicants for aid and to handle those cases deemed short-term, i.e. needing six months or less of assistance.

As the economy improved generosity increased, and much of this was administered through the Charity Organization Society, which operated under that name until January 1917.

Evelyn Gail Gardiner took over as executive secretary in January 1919, assuming a post that had been unfilled for more than a year.

A January 1921 effort by the city's business community to raise $100,000 for the league fell embarrassingly short.

In July 1930, Gardiner stepped down as executive secretary of the Social Welfare League, for health reasons.

On March 30, 1942, Japanese Americans from Bainbridge Island became the first in the nation to be interned, with those in Seattle not far behind.

The society hired its first clinical psychologist that year, and in 1950 psychological testing was introduced to assist counselors in determining what services would best help in particular cases.

In September 1961 the society opened a new office in Renton to serve South King County residents.

In 1964 United Good Neighbors, from which Family Counseling Service received 84 percent of its budget, fell significantly short on its annual fund drive.

The service now had 31 full-time social workers on staff, and in August 1967 opened a new office in Rainier Valley to better serve South Seattle.

Money problems led to the closure in May 1970 of the West Seattle Mental Health Center, opened only eight months earlier by the Family Counseling Service and the West Seattle Council on Youth Affairs.

Family Counseling Service brochure, Seattle, 1973

At its annual meeting in March 1974, Family Counseling Service voted to change its name to the Family and Child Services of Metropolitan Seattle.

In March 1984 Robert Watt, the former director of Youth Eastside Services, took charge.

Family Services of King County Annual Report, 1985

Forman served until July, 1990, when Ruthann Howell, only the second woman to head the agency, took over.

In 1994 the Travelers Aid Society joined the agency and became the Transitional Assistance Program, helping homeless individuals and families.

By the end of 1996, Family Services had 19 offices in King County to service its ever-expanding clientele, but still seemed perpetually short of funds.

The following year it started taking on clients insured by the federal government through Medicaid, a program that continued until 2004, when the agency concluded that administrative requirements had become too burdensome.

Wellspring Employee Assistance Program had been acquired in 2005 and Family Services had continued to run it under that name.

And in 2006, the agency kicked off its first-ever capital campaign.

And on June 26, 2009, with the grand opening ceremony for the Rotary Support Center for Families and 117 years after its founding, Wellspring Family Services had a permanent home.