Episode 11

In this episode of Meghan’s Place: Conversations on Healing, Meghan Fouad welcomes Pete Weldy, CEO of the California Alliance of Child and Family Services, for a meaningful conversation about the connection between healing and the systems that shape our lives.

Drawing on his extensive experience in public policy, nonprofit leadership, and government, Pete shares what inspired his commitment to supporting children, youth, and families. Together, Meghan and Pete explore how systems impact family well-being, what people often misunderstand about the challenges families face, and where gaps exist between policy decisions and the realities families experience every day.

This conversation invites listeners to think about healing through a broader lens. It highlights how community support, public systems, and policy decisions can influence our ability to heal, grow, and thrive. Whether you work with families, care about child and family well-being, or are interested in creating positive change, this episode offers valuable insight into building stronger and more supportive communities.

Join us for an engaging discussion about healing, advocacy, and the collective responsibility we share in helping children, youth, and families flourish.

Transcript

0:00

Hi, welcome to Megan's Place Conversations on Healing. I'm your host, Megan Floyd, and this is a space for honest conversations about mental and emotional health, healing relationships, and creating lasting change. Today we're talking about something really important, which is the connection between the systems around us and our ability to truly heal and thrive. And today I'm joined by Pete Weldie, CEO of California Alliance of Child and Family Services. Pete has spent his career working across public policy and nonprofit leadership to improve the lives of children, youth, and families. I am so glad that you're here today, Pete. Would you be able to share a little bit about yourself? Yeah, thank you, Megan. And thank you for inviting me to be here. It's very, very kind and looking forward to chatting. Yeah, I mean, I'm the CEO of the California Alliance. I've been in this role for almost a year. And just as quick background, I worked for the federal government for about five years as the regional administrator in the Health and Human Services Department, running human services programs, leading a staff of about 65 folks and about 12 billion dollars. Transitioned into this role in June of last year. And then before then, I was in the world of philanthropy and also spent some time in the state legislature in Indiana, where I'm born and raised. I'm a native Hoosier. And I've been in California now for about 10 years or so, all working in various um organizations with the missions to help and serve the most vulnerable kids and families. Uh-huh. It's really amazing work. And, you know, it makes me curious what drew you to this line of work of supporting children, youth, and families? It's a really, it's a really good question. In some ways, I would say it's like in my blood a little bit. My dad is a pastor. I grew up in the kind of Anabaptist tradition in Indiana, was raised kind of various degrees of conservative and would call myself progressive now, but I really held on to a lot of those really, really Christian beliefs that were just embedded in me. I come from a family of pastors. My grandfather was a pastor, my great-grandfather was a pastor, and a school teacher. And my dad was also a teacher, and my mom worked in public service. It's just like a part of my DNA, quite literally. And so there was never really any question that I would continue in that in that tradition. And also just because it's what I believe, you know, holding on to those core Christian tenets that like just drive what I do every day, loving your neighbor and trying my best to embody those the fruits of the spirit, you know. Um, that's really kind of what drives me to do this work. And it's not, it's not easy work, it's often, you know, frustrating work. But I also studied to be a music teacher. Um, I mean, I'm not doing anything like that, that now, but I did spend some time in the classroom, and that's really, I think, what uh set a fire in me is watching kids um and their families, I think, struggle and wanting to do something about it to help, and then getting stung by the political bee and realizing that that's a really great way to make a difference is by trying to improve these systems um to make a difference for for kids and families. So yeah. Absolutely. I mean, something I noticed so much because I also practice on the therapy side. Um, you know, I can work with people where they're at and, you know, meet their needs in a healing portion that way. But from that perspective, you can never really stop what's happened if they're going for help after the fact that it's happened. So really working from the systems approach, trying to be more preventative, I feel like is so important and something that we need a lot of. Um, although, you know, I think that there's always a need for things on both sides. We need the preventative care, but there's also probably not a way for us to completely eradicate any kind of systemic issue. Yeah, you're right. You're right. I mean, uh a lot of it is just, I mean, systems are so like they're abstracted. Um systems are abstract, but people are not. And people have designed these systems in a way that sometimes works and sometimes doesn't. People are imperfect, and the systems that they've designed are also imperfect. But as a colleague of mine always says, is that the systems are designed and getting the outcomes exactly as they've been intended to. Um, so how do we work with the systems that we've created to actually get the outcomes that we want to see? Um, and and I often ask myself, like, what are the systems? Like, what are they trying to solve for? And across all of these systems. And when we talk about systems in my world, we're talking about all these human services systems, we're talking about behavioral health systems and child care systems and child welfare and cash assistance. You know, in California, that's CowWorks, or Medi-Cal, or housing assistance, or energy assistance, or food assistance. Right. And all of these systems are designed essentially, in my opinion, to solve one thing, which is poverty. Um, and how do you really solve poverty? People need money. People need financial support to get all the things that they need, those basic, basic uh Maslow's hierarchy needs, you know, a roof over your head, clothes on your back, food in your mouths, um, an education, and all those things um require resources. And so we've built and designed systems to try to get the folks who need those. Um, but they're complex, overly complex. I talk about this a lot and think about it a lot. It's like, why have we designed such complex systems when the need is relatively simple? Someone needs food. Okay, great. But we've set up CalFresh or Snap, which is all of these barriers that we put in place because there's this understated, under said kind of value in this meritocracy meritocracy, or at least that's what we like to think of it in the United States, that there's some people who deserve something and then other people that just don't. And we see that playing out at the federal stage right now, uh, you know, a lot. Um, so there's a universality though to behavioral health needs because like everyone has mental health, of course. Right. Um, but if you're a person of means, typically you can go and you can get the help that you need. And those who don't have the means struggle. Um, so again, we built these overly complex systems um that don't align always, and but they're all intended to serve the same people. And that's what I think about a lot is like, how can we design systems that are getting all of these things that people need to the people in the easiest, most simple way as possible. But there are lots and lots of barriers that we've, you know, put into place for people. Um, and often it feels like these systems are designed to keep people out. You know, you have to prove that you're very poor, all these means-tested programs, you have to prove that you're poor, you have to prove that you have limited assets, you have to prove that you're working, you have to prove that you're getting an education. Uh, and all these barriers that we put into place make it overly complicated. And I think that that's that's often, I think, what people misunderstand about these systems is that people think, oh, like the government, my tax dollars are going to fund this, you know, housing assistance program. So why don't you just go grab a Section 8 voucher and call it a day? But that's a really loaded thing. Like, number one, there aren't enough vouchers. There's not enough housing supply. Um and we put additional barriers in in the way for families um who need who need help and support. So that's a lot of the kind of policy-driven work that the California Alliance does is to is to essentially break down barriers for all of our member organizations, the roughly 200 nonprofit organizations that are members of the California Alliance to do their jobs easier because they're all mission-aligned to help vulnerable kids, youth, and families and to make sure that they're able to do their jobs um in a way that's well resourced, but also that um removes some of these barriers for the families they're trying to serve. Absolutely. And, you know, being from the experience I've had working with Advent, I feel like that's one of the biggest things that I hear is, you know, people might maybe they're making enough to make ends meet barely, but then they also might not have enough to, you know, maybe they're sacrificing like, oh, well, you know, I can't get as much food as I want this month, but I don't qualify for these programs. Or qualifying for these programs is a lot of work. And so um, you know, I love that, you know, the work that you're doing with California Alliance is kind of helping to break down some of those systemic barriers and, you know, allow for more access because I've always believed that everyone should have access to those basic needs. You know, it's it shouldn't be like, oh, this person deserves it and this person doesn't. It's everyone, everyone needs it. Exactly. And that shouldn't be a radical thing to say, right? Like everyone needs healthcare. Like everyone, everyone needs a house. Exactly. Um and and yet we put so many, so many things in in place. And I think that again, people misunderstand just how easy they are to get or even how well funded they are. Um, because even some of the programs that are making a difference, their impact is limited just because of financial constraints. So um in the wealthiest country in the world, in the wealthiest state in the country, how do we um put systems in place or adjust the systems we've created in a in a way that just aligns to the lived experiences of those who need who need some help? Yeah. And I feel like you know that goes really well into the next question I wanted to ask you, which was where do you really see the biggest gaps between policy and the lived experiences of families? There's so many gaps. Um and I go back to this, I I go back to this complexity thing. Um part of the challenge in California, which is you not unique necessarily. There are other states that do it this way: New York, Minnesota, Wisconsin, North Carolina, but it's a it's a county-administered system. Um so before the dollar that's supposed to help whoever is in need gets to the person in need, it's going through three, four, five, six layers. Um, often the nonprofit organizations who are supporting these folks, um, you know, there's a federal dollar that goes to the state, the state then sends it down to the county, and then the county sends it to a nonprofit org, and then a nonprofit org uh provides a service or provides some assistance to someone who they've identified as having a need. That's really complicated. Um, and along the way, those dollars get smaller and smaller and smaller. Um and I think that that's a huge, huge gap. And and honestly, in California, politically really challenging to have that kind of conversation about the county-administered system and environment, because in with a state with 58 counties, there are 58 ways of doing doing things. And people aren't constrained to the geographies of counties. People move, people cross county lines all the time. I mean, I live in San Francisco and I'm I'm in every county all the time. And I've lived in multiple counties in the Bay Area. And if I had a need, I would have to change. So it kind of keeps people stuck because of the county administered environment. This is particularly true even in the child welfare system, is that often when there's a foster youth who needs some type of support, the support isn't available for them in a particular county. This is especially true in uh rural California. Uh, so they have to go across county lines. And the providers are ready to provide support, but it's the counties that can't seem to talk to each other or align their contracting barriers and all these other barriers that like if I just need uh behavioral health service, like I don't care about your contracting woes. So it's that very, that's that very kind of human thing, like the imperfection that I mentioned of these human design systems that put barriers into place. Um, the other thing that's about to be a huge gap that I think people are tracking, but I'm not sure even anyone who's tracking it realizes exactly how devastating it's going to be. But this is the impacts of HR one. Um and you know, the California Alliance advocated against it in partnership with many, many folks in the state. Um, and yet it passed. Of course, this is I refuse to call it by its actual name, the act, but called the big ugly bill. But I mean, even like conservative estimates are saying about a million and a half to upwards of three million Californians are going to lose the health insurance. But that doesn't mean they don't need health care. So we're going to be back to a system of overloaded emergency rooms and people having unmet behavioral health needs. And we don't want to go back to that place. Um, and I think the most nefarious thing about HR one, where there's a huge policy gap, is this thing that I mentioned earlier, which is about like there's unstated value in HR1 that says some people deserve health insured and some people don't. And that's just wrong, in my opinion. It's yeah, immoral. And yet we're going to have people, because of things that are technical in nature, um, where folks may show up thinking they have insurance and they don't, or folks thinking they don't um are not eligible, so they never apply. But these things like increased work requirements, again, to prove you're worthy, and increased uh redetermination periods, every six months someone has to go now and say, hey, actually, I need to, you know, keep my keep my medical insurance, please. Um, and that's really, really hard. And and I feel for the state, who are doing their best to put in a system in place that's going to make it as easy as possible. Lots of tech things happening on the back end to pull from different data sources to see, okay, actually, from this data source you are eligible. Ex parte redeterminations, they call them. Um, but again, that's really it's really complicated. And the person that just needs health insurance, you know, do they do they care? So I think that that is that is that is upcoming um next year and is going to be particularly devastating, not just for for the people who need health insurance, but for California's budget. Because now California is in a facing uh a budget surplus this year, but in out years they're anticipating a deficit. And if the economy takes a downturn, then the state is going to be really struggling. So the state legislature right now, as they're going through budget negotiations through the next, you know, 30 days, um, have to have to grapple with that. So there are other transformation efforts happening that were, I think, well intended, but have uh consequences. I mean, you mentioned prevention programming, and that is so essential. And yet there's a proposition one, which is passed by voters in 2024, and the Behavioral Health Services Act, they're one and the same, that was a result of the passing of Prop 1, shifts uh some funds from counties to the state. And so counties are having to make really difficult decisions. And all of them, because of these 58 different ways of doing things or making different types of decisions. A lot of counties are cutting their prevention programs. So as you're cutting prevention programs that are provided by many of the nonprofit organizations the alliance represents, you also have people losing their health insurance and you have budget deficits and you have other cruel, mean federal cuts happening. So for you know, nonprofit organizations, it kind of feels like the sky is falling a little bit. Um, and we just have to kind of weather the storm, at least for the next next two and a half years, um, to try to do what we can. Uh it's a lot of playing defense right now, but there are policy gaps all over the place. And right now, those gaps are just trying to like stick your finger in the in the dam, is kind of what it feels like. And I know that that's true of many organizations that are sisters to the alliance that feel the same way, that have other that represent counties, that represent um other types of provider organizations. Um, true for the state legislature, everyone's kind of in that place right now. Right. And, you know, I think you made such a good analogy about that with, you know, it's like sticking your finger in the dam. And I think that, you know, that's what I feel a lot working on, you know, this end of things. Um, because, you know, so often, like, sure, I get to do the individual work with people, but it's not really fixing the whole issue by any means. It's like, oh, I can make these recommendations, I can do all of this. But, you know, again, oh, I'm telling someone, yeah, apply for covered California, apply for Medi-Cal. To what end? Especially if it's going to have to be renewed in six months. And it was all they could do to even apply in the first place. Um, you know, I feel like that's a huge challenge that's going to be coming up soon. Um, that it's going to be a big barrier for people seeking care. And so, I mean, for me, I'm glad that there are at least a couple organizations um that provide very like low-cost mental health care, but that still doesn't really that doesn't really change it as a whole, um, especially if people are going to be facing higher troubles getting um the care that they need. And I know um some big organizations, like big healthcare organizations are already struggling um to meet the needs. And so they're contracting out, and then sometimes those contracts don't pan out or they're harder to access. Um, so I do I have some fears going forward of what things will look like, especially in the behavioral and mental health um sector. Absolutely. And um I mean, and the work that like Advent does is so important right now. The work that all of these nonprofit orgs do, they are the state's safety net. The state contracts out a lot of these services that are essential to so many Californians. And it's those organizations that are that are challenged and struggling um right now. So Right. And you know, I think that what we've talked about here today is so important to bring awareness to because I think a lot of the times um people might overlook it, or you know, it's sometimes one of those things where if it doesn't affect you, you might not see how it's affecting others. Um, you know, if you've never really had to engage with the systems on those levels and see what it's like to actually try to get on CalFresh or something like that. Um, you may not really understand, you know, how many barriers there are. And also um you may not really be aware of changes that might be coming. Um and so I think that this discussion that you and I have had here today has been so important. Um and I wasn't sure if you had any final thoughts or anything that you really wanted to share on that. Well, I just I really appreciate you inviting me again. And um I think that the the magic though of the work that it kind of brings me, brings me hope is is so I used to I kind of cut my teeth in the world of early childhood policy. Um so all things zero to five, from paid family leave to child care to home visiting programs, things like that. And there's all this research, right, that demonstrates like the first five years are so important from a brain development perspective, but setting you up for success for the rest of your life, those first five years are really important. And the state's dedicated a lot of funding in that space, and they should be applauded for that. And everyone talks about the research. The research at the end of the day, to distill it down to maybe be offensively simple, is it's just about a relationship between a child and a caring adult. That's it. That's the magic. But that's also true for adults. It's just the magic is a caring adult with another person. That's it. And this is what like so many provider organizations are doing every day, despite the headwinds and challenges. The work that like you do, Megan, the work that Advent does is about being that caring adult in someone's life. And like that's it. And if we just start to like be that simple and say, and hey, that costs some money, like, can we dedicate state resources to support programs like these and the adults who are caring, who are providing services? That's that's really all. And and start to unwind some of these really overly complex systems where we put in too many barriers. So I love that approach to it. And you know, it plays so much into what I believe in for my clinical practice. I really practice from um, you know, an attachment-based theory. So it's really interesting hearing you say that because I believe so much of how we are in our childhood, who we are in our adolescence and adulthood is determined by our early childhood relationships and having a secure relationship with a caring adult can determine so much. And so I think, you know, you really hit it on the head there with that is where the magic is. That's where the magic is. Well, you know, I appreciate you so much for being here and for sharing your perspective. And to everyone listening, thank you for being a part of this space. And if this episode resonated with you, feel free to share it with someone who might need it. And as always, keep showing up for your healing. I will see you the Monday after next on Megan's Place.