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Nonprofit of the Year: (Medium): Lutheran Child and Family Services
CEO: Sven Schumacher
Chair: John Tape
From its campus across from Community Hospital East in Indianapolis, Lutheran Child and Family Services provides a variety of programs that address food insecurity, mental health challenges and housing, all under the slogan, “Engaging and empowering families and community with love, compassion, faith and support.”
Its social services include:
• Pando Aspen Grove of Community Heights, a housing initiative designed for youth 18-24 who are aging out of foster care and facing housing insecurity. Unlike traditional shelters or transitional housing, Pando combines permanent housing with behavioral health, employment and life skills services to ensure long-term stability and life-readiness skills.
• Residential group homes, which serve youth who require a high level of clinical care, often as an alternative to juvenile detention or psychiatric hospitalization. LCFS developed this program in partnership with Ascent 121, which provides advocacy and recovery services for Indiana teen survivors of domestic trafficking.
• INSPIRE, which provides home-based, two-generation support to families at risk of separation. These programs also strengthen family functioning, address generational trauma and improve long-term outcomes for both parents and children.
• The Sharing Place food pantry and SilverBox Home Delivery programs, which address food insecurity for individuals, seniors and families in need. The two programs served more than 75,000 people in 2024.
LCFS provides the programs in collaboration with a host of community partners, including Community Hospital East, Indianapolis Public Schools and Gleaners Food Bank of Indiana, and with funding from the United Way, Lilly Endowment Inc. and Central Indiana Community Foundation.
That is the big picture.
Then there are the stories, as told by executive director/lifelong social worker Sven Schumacher and former school teacher/development manager Jenny Okamoto, which offer an intimate picture of an organization devoted to making life better for people who are having a rough time.
“We have everyday stories of our folks at Sharing Place,” Schumacher said. “They get some quality food, and we know that doesn’t solve all of their problems, but there’s one problem down. They get fed, and the kids get fed, and there’s a little smile.”
There was the volunteer who was putting together a basketball tournament for kids in LCFS programming. One of the girls in the program told him, “I’ve never been in a tournament in my life. I didn’t even really know how this works.”
“That’s the experience of lots of kids in the child welfare system,” Schumacher said. “They’re not the ones that are able to participate in many things.”
Okamoto tells the story of clients who were previously homeless and lived in LCFS housing for about two years. In that time, they were able to start their own business and move into a permanent home.
“The last time I saw them, they were speaking at a conference about homelessness, and they got to introduce the keynote speaker,” she said. “They’ve become an advocate for other folks who were going through very similar experiences. So, to go from having no place to live to being on a national stage and introducing other people who shared their experience is pretty powerful.”•
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