Cape Cod Foster Closet Joins Us!

April In-Person Meeting
Cape Cod Synagogue, April 19 - 10:30

On April 19th, Carla Koehl, Community Outreach Director for the Cape Foster Closet, will join us to speak about this organization and their experiences serving a variety of families on Cape Cod and the Islands who are raising other people's biological children, with a particular focus on the many, many grandparents we see who are raising their grandchildren. Anecdotally speaking, this group tends to be the most reluctant to seek out, or to accept, help. She will be discussing those and other dynamics, as well as how they are partnering with various agencies across the Cape to find solutions to these and related issues.

Also, we will be joined by Andy and Sharon Palmer, who founded the Cape Foster Closet in February 2021. As licensed foster parents, they are acutely aware of the time, energy and expense involved in serving as a foster family. They recognize that many people decide to become foster parents as an act of faith.

It is a special calling to provide a safe, healthy and loving environment for children who need stability and acceptance while their family situations are being sorted out.

Although not everyone can be a foster parent, each of us can support a foster family in our own unique way.

Our Mission

Our mission is to support foster families by providing clothing, basic necessities, helping hands and emotional support.

Our Vision

We envision a vibrant community of compassionate, like-minded individuals who desire to encourage, serve, and nurture foster families.

As we all have seen, and as is widely documented, many incidents of gun violence occur due to poor life choices or options that people are given, and we applaud any group willing to work toward helping all our children and their caregivers work toward better outcomes.

About Carla:

Carla Koehl (pronounced “kale”) is Community Outreach Director for the Cape Cod Foster Closet, a two-year-old nonprofit that serves local foster, caregiver, pre-adoptive and kinship families (Including grandparents raising their grandchildren) by providing social-emotional support, information, and urgently needed clothing, shoes, diapers, baby gear and more for newborns through age 18.

Before joining the Cape Cod Foster Closet, Carla was marketing director for an Alzheimer’s residential community in Lexington, Mass., where she earned her CDP (Certified Dementia Practitioner) designation and became a “Dementia Friend,” teaching multiple area businesses and community groups on strategies for successfully interacting with those with various forms of dementia.

Earlier in her career, Carla spent more than ten years in journalism, most of them as an associate editor for Newsweek magazine in New York. Following that, she started and sold three small businesses, including one focused on move management for seniors, and another on organizational strategies for parents who have children with special needs. She has also served as co-chair of the Natick Special Education Parents Advisory Council.

Carla grew up in New York City, is a Red Sox fan by marriage, and a graduate of Northwestern University’s Medill School of Journalism. As recent empty nesters, Carla, her husband Tom Keane, and their dog Bear made their Centerville home their permanent residence just last year.

Carla can be reached at CKoehl@CapeCodFosterCloset .