SCCC Board of Directors shine!

From Marianne Diaz, Director of Outreach Services at SCCC reflects on Board support as we navigate our partnership with Watts Labor Community Action Committee, where we began providing services in June 2014:

“The Southern California Counseling Center’s Board of Directors is a gift to the clients of Los Angeles and particularly, the underserved community of Watts.  The amount of need that community has can never be filled completely and this is just a simple reality.  The Center, and especially, the Board, has consistently provided the support we needed in this overwhelming project.  What we have seen in return is a shift in how the community responds to the idea of therapy, counseling and being mandated.

Our approach, with so much respect and understanding of the systemic oppression that this and many other communities have faced, has opened up relationships that have proven to be long reaching in a distrusting community. People are talking about this relational encounter that is strength focused and empowerment based. This is so different than the punitive services many have received and we believe that in recognition of their own resiliency and the resiliency of the community, the relationship supports a different way to cope and a safer way to respond to the everyday obstacles this population must face.

I am honored to be a part of this mental health agency that believes in the continuity of care for those least likely to be offered the quality of care the Southern California Counseling Center brings. Outreach is doing what we were meant to do; reaching beyond these walls.”